homework effects on sleep

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• December 12, 2018

Teens, Sleep and Homework Survey Results

Better sleep council research finds that too much homework can actually hurt teens' performance in school.

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ALEXANDRIA, Va. , Dec. 11, 2018 – According to new research from the Better Sleep Council (BSC) – the nonprofit consumer-education arm of the International Sleep Products Association – homework, rather than social pressure, is the number one cause of teenage stress, negatively affecting their sleep and ultimately impacting their academic performance.

American teenagers said they spend 15+ hours a week on homework, and about one-third (34%) of all teens spend 20 or more hours a week. This is more than time spent at work, school clubs, social activities and sports. When asked what causes stress in their lives, about three-quarters of teens said grades/test scores (75%) and/or homework (74%) cause stress, more than self-esteem (51%), parental expectations (45%) and even bullying (15%). In fact, according to the American Psychological Association’s Stress in America™ Survey, during the school year, teenagers say they experience stress levels higher than those reported by adults.

Further, more than half (57%) of all teenagers surveyed do not feel they get enough sleep. Seventy-nine percent reported getting 7 hours of sleep or less on a typical school night, more than two-thirds (67%) say they only get 5 to 7 hours of sleep on a school night, and only about one in five teens is getting 8 hours of sleep or more. Based on the BSC’s findings, the more stressed teenagers feel, the more likely they are to get less sleep, go to bed later and wake up earlier. They are also more likely to have trouble going to sleep and staying asleep – more often than their less-stressed peers.

“We’re finding that teenagers are experiencing this cycle where they sacrifice their sleep to spend extra time on homework, which gives them more stress – but they don’t get better grades,” said Mary Helen Rogers , vice president of marketing and communications for the Better Sleep Council. “The BSC understands the impact sleep has on teenagers’ overall development, so we can help them reduce this stress through improved sleep habits.”

The BSC recommends that teens between the ages of 13-18 get 8-10 hours of sleep per night. For teens to get the sleep their bodies need for optimal school performance, they should consider the following tips:

• Establish a consistent bedtime routine . Just like they set time aside for homework, they should schedule at least 8 hours of sleep into their daily calendars. It may be challenging in the beginning, but it will help in the long run.
• Keep it quiet in the bedroom.  It’s easier to sleep when there isn’t extra noise. Teens may even want to wear earplugs if their home is too noisy.
• Create a relaxing sleep environment. Make sure the bedroom is clutter-free, dark and conducive to great sleep. A cool bedroom, between 65 and 67 degrees , is ideal to help teens sleep.
• Cut back on screen time. Try cutting off screen time at least an hour before bed. The blue light emitted from electronics’ screens disturbs sleep.
• Examine their mattress. Since a mattress is an important component of a good night’s sleep, consider replacing it if it isn’t providing comfort and support, or hasn’t been changed in at least seven years.

Other takeaways on the relationship between homework, stress and sleep in teenagers include:

• Teens who feel more stress (89%) are more likely than less-stressed teens (65%) to say homework causes them stress in their lives.
• More than three-quarters (76%) of teens who feel more stress say they don’t feel they get enough sleep – which is significantly higher than teens who are not stressed, since only 42% of them feel they don’t get enough sleep.
• Teens who feel more stress (51%) are more likely than less-stressed teens (35%) to get to bed at 11 p.m. or later. Among these teens who are going to bed later, about 33% of them said they are waking up at 6:00 a.m. or earlier.
• Students who go to bed earlier and awaken earlier perform better academically than those who stay up late – even to do homework.

About the BSC The Better Sleep Council is the consumer-education arm of the International Sleep Products Association, the trade association for the mattress industry. With decades invested in improving sleep quality, the BSC educates consumers on the link between sleep and health, and the role of the sleep environment, primarily through www.bettersleep.org , partner support and consumer outreach.

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Homework, Sleep, and the Student Brain

At some point, every parent wishes their high school aged student would go to bed earlier as well as find time to pursue their own passions -- or maybe even choose to relax. This thought reemerged as I reread Anna Quindlen's commencement speech, A Short Guide to a Happy Life. The central message of this address, never actually stated, was: "Get a life."

But what prevents students from "getting a life," especially between September and June? One answer is homework.

Favorable Working Conditions

As a history teacher at St. Andrew's Episcopal School and director of the Center for Transformative Teaching and Learning , I want to be clear that I both give and support the idea of homework. But homework, whether good or bad, takes time and often cuts into each student's sleep, family dinner, or freedom to follow passions outside of school. For too many students, homework is too often about compliance and "not losing points" rather than about learning.

Most schools have a philosophy about homework that is challenged by each parent's experience doing homework "back in the day." Parents' common misconception is that the teachers and schools giving more homework are more challenging and therefore better teachers and schools. This is a false assumption. The amount of homework your son or daughter does each night should not be a source of pride for the quality of a school. In fact, I would suggest a different metric when evaluating your child's homework. Are you able to stay up with your son or daughter until he or she finishes those assignments? If the answer is no, then too much homework is being assigned, and you both need more of the sleep that, according to Daniel T. Willingham , is crucial to memory consolidation.

I have often joked with my students, while teaching the Progressive Movement and rise of unions between the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, that they should consider striking because of how schools violate child labor laws. If school is each student's "job," then students are working hours usually assigned to Washington, DC lawyers (combing the hours of the school day, school-sponsored activities, and homework). This would certainly be a risky strategy for changing how schools and teachers think about homework, but it certainly would gain attention. (If any of my students are reading this, don't try it!)

So how can we change things?

The Scientific Approach

In the study "What Great Homework Looks Like" from the journal Think Differently and Deeply , which connects research in how the brain learns to the instructional practice of teachers, we see moderate advantages of no more than two hours of homework for high school students. For younger students, the correlation is even smaller. Homework does teach other important, non-cognitive skills such as time management, sustained attention, and rule following, but let us not mask that as learning the content and skills that most assignments are supposed to teach.

Homework can be a powerful learning tool -- if designed and assigned correctly. I say "learning," because good homework should be an independent moment for each student or groups of students through virtual collaboration. It should be challenging and engaging enough to allow for deliberate practice of essential content and skills, but not so hard that parents are asked to recall what they learned in high school. All that usually leads to is family stress.

But even when good homework is assigned, it is the student's approach that is critical. A scientific approach to tackling their homework can actually lead to deepened learning in less time. The biggest contributor to the length of a student's homework is task switching. Too often, students jump between their work on an assignment and the lure of social media. But I have found it hard to convince students of the cost associated with such task switching. Imagine a student writing an essay for AP English class or completing math proofs for their honors geometry class. In the middle of the work, their phone announces a new text message. This is a moment of truth for the student. Should they address that text before or after they finish their assignment?

Delayed Gratification

When a student chooses to check their text, respond and then possibly take an extended dive into social media, they lose a percentage of the learning that has already happened. As a result, when they return to the AP essay or honors geometry proof, they need to retrace their learning in order to catch up to where they were. This jump, between homework and social media, is actually extending the time a student spends on an assignment. My colleagues and I coach our students to see social media as a reward for finishing an assignment. Delaying gratification is an important non-cognitive skill and one that research has shown enhances life outcomes (see the Stanford Marshmallow Test ).

At my school, the goal is to reduce the barriers for each student to meet his or her peak potential without lowering the bar. Good, purposeful homework should be part of any student's learning journey. But it takes teachers to design better homework (which can include no homework at all on some nights), parents to not see hours of homework as a measure of school quality, and students to reflect on their current homework strategies while applying new, research-backed ones. Together, we can all get more sleep -- and that, research shows, is very good for all of our brains and for each student's learning.

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Education scholar Denise Pope has found that too much homework has negative effects on student well-being and behavioral engagement. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero)

A Stanford researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.

“Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good,” wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .

The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students’ views on homework.

Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.

Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.

“The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students’ advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being,” Pope wrote.

Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.

Their study found that too much homework is associated with:

* Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.

* Reductions in health: In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.

* Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits: Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were “not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills,” according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.

A balancing act

The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.

Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as “pointless” or “mindless” in order to keep their grades up.

“This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points,” Pope said.

She said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.

“Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development,” wrote Pope.

High-performing paradox

In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. “Young people are spending more time alone,” they wrote, “which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities.”

Student perspectives

The researchers say that while their open-ended or “self-reporting” methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for “typical adolescent complaining” – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.

The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Media Contacts

Denise Pope, Stanford Graduate School of Education: (650) 725-7412, [email protected] Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-0224, [email protected]

The Impact of Sleep on Learning and Memory

By Kelly Cappello, B.A.

For many students, staying awake all night to study is common practice. According to Medical News Today , around 20 percent of students pull all-nighters at least once a month, and about 35 percent stay up past three in the morning once or more weekly.

That being said, staying up all night to study is one of the worst things students can do for their grades. In October of 2019, two MIT professors found a correlation between sleep and test scores : The less students slept during the semester, the worse their scores.

So, why is it that sleep is so important for test scores? While the answer seems simple, that students simply perform better when they’re not mentally or physically tired, the truth may be far more complicated and interesting.

In the last 20 years, scientists have found that sleep impacts more than just students’ ability to perform well; it improves their ability to learn, memorize, retain, recall, and use their new knowledge to solve problems creatively. All of which contribute to better test scores.

Let’s take a look at some of the most interesting research regarding the impact of sleep on learning and memory.

How does sleep improve the ability to learn?

When learning facts and information, most of what we learn is temporarily stored in a region of the brain called the hippocampus. Some scientists hypothesize that , like most storage centers, the hippocampus has limited storage capacity. This means, if the hippocampus is full, and we try to learn more information, we won’t be able to.

Fortunately, many scientists also hypothesize that sleep, particularly Stages 2 and 3 sleep, plays a role in replenishing our ability to learn. In one study, a group of 44 participants underwent two rigorous sessions of learning, once at noon and again at 6:00 PM. Half of the group was allowed to nap between sessions, while the other half took part in standard activities. The researchers found that the group that napped between learning sessions learned just as easily at 6:00 PM as they did at noon. The group that didn’t nap, however, experienced a significant decrease in learning ability [1].

How does sleep improve the ability to recall information?

Humans have known about the benefits of sleep for memory recall for thousands of years. In fact, the first record of this revelation is from the first century AD. Rhetorician Quintilian stated, “It is a curious fact, of which the reason is not obvious, that the interval of a single night will greatly increase the strength of the memory.”

In the last century, scientists have tested this theory many times, often finding that sleep improves memory retention and recall by between 20 and 40 percent. Recent research has led scientists to hypothesize that Stage 3 (deep non-Rapid Eye Movement sleep, or Slow Wave Sleep) may be especially important for the improvement of memory retention and recall [2].

How does sleep improve long-term memory? 

Scientists hypothesize that sleep also plays a major role in forming long-term memories. According to Matthew Walker, professor of neuroscience and psychology at UC Berkeley, MRI scans indicate that the slow brain waves of stage 3 sleep (deep NREM sleep) “serve as a courier service,” transporting memories from the hippocampus to other more permanent storage sites [3].

How does sleep improve the ability to solve problems creatively?

Many tests are designed to assess critical thinking and creative problem-solving skills. Recent research has led scientists to hypothesize that sleep, particularly REM sleep, plays a role in strengthening these skills. In one study, scientists tested the effect of REM sleep on the ability to solve anagram puzzles (word scrambles like “EOUSM” for “MOUSE”), an ability that requires strong creative thinking and problem-solving skills.

In the study, participants solved a couple of anagram puzzles before going to sleep in a sleep laboratory with electrodes placed on their heads. The subjects were woken up four times during the night to solve anagram puzzles, twice during NREM sleep and twice during REM sleep.

The researchers found that when participants were woken up during REM sleep, they could solve 15 to 35 percent more puzzles than they could when woken up from NREM sleep. They also performed 15 to 35 percent better than they did in the middle of the day [4]. It seems that REM sleep may play a major role in improving the ability to solve complex problems.

So, what’s the point?

Sleep research from the last 20 years indicates that sleep does more than simply give students the energy they need to study and perform well on tests. Sleep actually helps students learn, memorize, retain, recall, and use their new knowledge to come up with creative and innovative solutions.

It’s no surprise that the MIT study previously mentioned revealed no improvement in scores for those who only prioritized their sleep the night before a big test. In fact, the MIT researchers concluded that if students want to see an improvement in their test scores, they have to prioritize their sleep during the entire learning process. Staying up late to study just doesn’t pay off.

Interested in learning more about the impact of sleep on learning and memory? Check out this Student Sleep Guide .

Author Biography

Kelly Cappello graduated from East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania with a B.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies in 2015. She is now a writer, specialized in researching complex topics and writing about them in simple English. She currently writes for Recharge.Energy , a company dedicated to helping the public improve their sleep and improve their lives.

• Mander, Bryce A., et al. “Wake Deterioration and Sleep Restoration of Human Learning.” Current Biology, vol. 21, no. 5, 2011, doi:10.1016/j.cub.2011.01.019.
• Walker M. P. (2009). The role of slow wave sleep in memory processing. Journal of clinical sleep medicine : JCSM : official publication of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, 5(2 Suppl), S20–S26.
• Walker, Matthew. Why We Sleep. Scribner, 2017.
• Walker, Matthew P, et al. “Cognitive Flexibility across the Sleep–Wake Cycle: REM-Sleep Enhancement of Anagram Problem Solving.” Cognitive Brain Research, vol. 14, no. 3, 2002, pp. 317–324., doi:10.1016/s0926-6410(02)00134-9.

Posted on Dec 21, 2020 | Tagged: learning and memory

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Among teens, sleep deprivation an epidemic

Sleep deprivation increases the likelihood teens will suffer myriad negative consequences, including an inability to concentrate, poor grades, drowsy-driving incidents, anxiety, depression, thoughts of suicide and even suicide attempts.

October 8, 2015 - By Ruthann Richter

The most recent national poll shows that more than 87 percent of U.S. high school students get far less than the recommended eight to 10 hours of sleep each night. Christopher Silas Neal

Carolyn Walworth, 17, often reaches a breaking point around 11 p.m., when she collapses in tears. For 10 minutes or so, she just sits at her desk and cries, overwhelmed by unrelenting school demands. She is desperately tired and longs for sleep. But she knows she must move through it, because more assignments in physics, calculus or French await her. She finally crawls into bed around midnight or 12:30 a.m.

The next morning, she fights to stay awake in her first-period U.S. history class, which begins at 8:15. She is unable to focus on what’s being taught, and her mind drifts. “You feel tired and exhausted, but you think you just need to get through the day so you can go home and sleep,” said the Palo Alto, California, teen. But that night, she will have to try to catch up on what she missed in class. And the cycle begins again.

“It’s an insane system. … The whole essence of learning is lost,” she said.

Walworth is among a generation of teens growing up chronically sleep-deprived. According to a 2006 National Sleep Foundation poll, the organization’s most recent survey of teen sleep, more than 87 percent of high school students in the United States get far less than the recommended eight to 10 hours, and the amount of time they sleep is decreasing — a serious threat to their health, safety and academic success. Sleep deprivation increases the likelihood teens will suffer myriad negative consequences, including an inability to concentrate, poor grades, drowsy-driving incidents, anxiety, depression, thoughts of suicide and even suicide attempts. It’s a problem that knows no economic boundaries.

While studies show that both adults and teens in industrialized nations are becoming more sleep deprived, the problem is most acute among teens, said Nanci Yuan , MD, director of the Stanford Children’s Health Sleep Center . In a detailed 2014 report, the American Academy of Pediatrics called the problem of tired teens a public health epidemic.

“I think high school is the real danger spot in terms of sleep deprivation,” said William Dement , MD, PhD, founder of the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic , the first of its kind in the world. “It’s a huge problem. What it means is that nobody performs at the level they could perform,” whether it’s in school, on the roadways, on the sports field or in terms of physical and emotional health.

Social and cultural factors, as well as the advent of technology, all have collided with the biology of the adolescent to prevent teens from getting enough rest. Since the early 1990s, it’s been established that teens have a biologic tendency to go to sleep later — as much as two hours later — than their younger counterparts.

Yet when they enter their high school years, they find themselves at schools that typically start the day at a relatively early hour. So their time for sleep is compressed, and many are jolted out of bed before they are physically or mentally ready. In the process, they not only lose precious hours of rest, but their natural rhythm is disrupted, as they are being robbed of the dream-rich, rapid-eye-movement stage of sleep, some of the deepest, most productive sleep time, said pediatric sleep specialist Rafael Pelayo , MD, with the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic.

“When teens wake up earlier, it cuts off their dreams,” said Pelayo, a clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences. “We’re not giving them a chance to dream.”

Teens have a biologic tendency to go to sleep later, yet many high schools start the day at a relatively early hour, disrupting their natural rhythym. Monkey Business/Fotolia

Understanding teen sleep

On a sunny June afternoon, Dement maneuvered his golf cart, nicknamed the Sleep and Dreams Shuttle, through the Stanford University campus to Jerry House, a sprawling, Mediterranean-style dormitory where he and his colleagues conducted some of the early, seminal work on sleep, including teen sleep.

Beginning in 1975, the researchers recruited a few dozen local youngsters between the ages of 10 and 12 who were willing to participate in a unique sleep camp. During the day, the young volunteers would play volleyball in the backyard, which faces a now-barren Lake Lagunita, all the while sporting a nest of electrodes on their heads.

At night, they dozed in a dorm while researchers in a nearby room monitored their brain waves on 6-foot electroencephalogram machines, old-fashioned polygraphs that spit out wave patterns of their sleep.

One of Dement’s colleagues at the time was Mary Carskadon, PhD, then a graduate student at Stanford. They studied the youngsters over the course of several summers, observing their sleep habits as they entered puberty and beyond.

Dement and Carskadon had expected to find that as the participants grew older, they would need less sleep. But to their surprise, their sleep needs remained the same — roughly nine hours a night — through their teen years. “We thought, ‘Oh, wow, this is interesting,’” said Carskadon, now a professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University and a nationally recognized expert on teen sleep.

Moreover, the researchers made a number of other key observations that would plant the seed for what is now accepted dogma in the sleep field. For one, they noticed that when older adolescents were restricted to just five hours of sleep a night, they would become progressively sleepier during the course of the week. The loss was cumulative, accounting for what is now commonly known as sleep debt.

“The concept of sleep debt had yet to be developed,” said Dement, the Lowell W. and Josephine Q. Berry Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. It’s since become the basis for his ongoing campaign against drowsy driving among adults and teens. “That’s why you have these terrible accidents on the road,” he said. “People carry a large sleep debt, which they don’t understand and cannot evaluate.”

The researchers also noticed that as the kids got older, they were naturally inclined to go to bed later. By the early 1990s, Carskadon established what has become a widely recognized phenomenon — that teens experience a so-called sleep-phase delay. Their circadian rhythm — their internal biological clock — shifts to a later time, making it more difficult for them to fall asleep before 11 p.m.

Teens are also biologically disposed to a later sleep time because of a shift in the system that governs the natural sleep-wake cycle. Among older teens, the push to fall asleep builds more slowly during the day, signaling them to be more alert in the evening.

“It’s as if the brain is giving them permission, or making it easier, to stay awake longer,” Carskadon said. “So you add that to the phase delay, and it’s hard to fight against it.”

Pressures not to sleep

After an evening with four or five hours of homework, Walworth turns to her cellphone for relief. She texts or talks to friends and surfs the Web. “It’s nice to stay up and talk to your friends or watch a funny YouTube video,” she said. “There are plenty of online distractions.”

While teens are biologically programmed to stay up late, many social and cultural forces further limit their time for sleep. For one, the pressure on teens to succeed is intense, and they must compete with a growing number of peers for college slots that have largely remained constant. In high-achieving communities like Palo Alto, that translates into students who are overwhelmed by additional homework for Advanced Placement classes, outside activities such as sports or social service projects, and in some cases, part-time jobs, as well as peer, parental and community pressures to excel.

William Dement

At the same time, today’s teens are maturing in an era of ubiquitous electronic media, and they are fervent participants. Some 92 percent of U.S. teens have smartphones, and 24 percent report being online “constantly,” according to a 2015 report by the Pew Research Center. Teens have access to multiple electronic devices they use simultaneously, often at night. Some 72 percent bring cellphones into their bedrooms and use them when they are trying to go to sleep, and 28 percent leave their phones on while sleeping, only to be awakened at night by texts, calls or emails, according to a 2011 National Sleep Foundation poll on electronic use. In addition, some 64 percent use electronic music devices, 60 percent use laptops and 23 percent play video games in the hour before they went to sleep, the poll found. More than half reported texting in the hour before they went to sleep, and these media fans were less likely to report getting a good night’s sleep and feeling refreshed in the morning. They were also more likely to drive when drowsy, the poll found.

The problem of sleep-phase delay is exacerbated when teens are exposed late at night to lit screens, which send a message via the retina to the portion of the brain that controls the body’s circadian clock. The message: It’s not nighttime yet.

Yuan, a clinical associate professor of pediatrics, said she routinely sees young patients in her clinic who fall asleep at night with cellphones in hand.

“With academic demands and extracurricular activities, the kids are going nonstop until they fall asleep exhausted at night. There is not an emphasis on the importance of sleep, as there is with nutrition and exercise,” she said. “They say they are tired, but they don’t realize they are actually sleep-deprived. And if you ask kids to remove an activity, they would rather not. They would rather give up sleep than an activity.”

The role of parents

Adolescents are also entering a period in which they are striving for autonomy and want to make their own decisions, including when to go to sleep. But studies suggest adolescents do better in terms of mood and fatigue levels if parents set the bedtime — and choose a time that is realistic for the child’s needs. According to a 2010 study published in the journal Sleep , children are more likely to be depressed and to entertain thoughts of suicide if a parent sets a late bedtime of midnight or beyond.

In families where parents set the time for sleep, the teens’ happier, better-rested state “may be a sign of an organized family life, not simply a matter of bedtime,” Carskadon said. “On the other hand, the growing child and growing teens still benefit from someone who will help set the structure for their lives. And they aren’t good at making good decisions.”

They say they are tired, but they don’t realize they are actually sleep-deprived. And if you ask kids to remove an activity, they would rather not. They would rather give up sleep than an activity.

According to the 2011 sleep poll, by the time U.S. students reach their senior year in high school, they are sleeping an average of 6.9 hours a night, down from an average of 8.4 hours in the sixth grade. The poll included teens from across the country from diverse ethnic backgrounds.

American teens aren’t the worst off when it comes to sleep, however; South Korean adolescents have that distinction, sleeping on average 4.9 hours a night, according to a 2012 study in Sleep by South Korean researchers. These Asian teens routinely begin school between 7 and 8:30 a.m., and most sign up for additional evening classes that may keep them up as late as midnight. South Korean adolescents also have relatively high suicide rates (10.7 per 100,000 a year), and the researchers speculate that chronic sleep deprivation is a contributor to this disturbing phenomenon.

By contrast, Australian teens are among those who do particularly well when it comes to sleep time, averaging about nine hours a night, possibly because schools there usually start later.

Regardless of where they live, most teens follow a pattern of sleeping less during the week and sleeping in on the weekends to compensate. But many accumulate such a backlog of sleep debt that they don’t sufficiently recover on the weekend and still wake up fatigued when Monday comes around.

Moreover, the shifting sleep patterns on the weekend — late nights with friends, followed by late mornings in bed — are out of sync with their weekday rhythm. Carskadon refers to this as “social jet lag.”

“Every day we teach our internal circadian timing system what time it is — is it day or night? — and if that message is substantially different every day, then the clock isn’t able to set things appropriately in motion,” she said. “In the last few years, we have learned there is a master clock in the brain, but there are other clocks in other organs, like liver or kidneys or lungs, so the master clock is the coxswain, trying to get everybody to work together to improve efficiency and health. So if the coxswain is changing the pace, all the crew become disorganized and don’t function well.”

This disrupted rhythm, as well as the shortage of sleep, can have far-reaching effects on adolescent health and well-being, she said.

“It certainly plays into learning and memory. It plays into appetite and metabolism and weight gain. It plays into mood and emotion, which are already heightened at that age. It also plays into risk behaviors — taking risks while driving, taking risks with substances, taking risks maybe with sexual activity. So the more we look outside, the more we’re learning about the core role that sleep plays,” Carskadon said.

Many studies show students who sleep less suffer academically, as chronic sleep loss impairs the ability to remember, concentrate, think abstractly and solve problems. In one of many studies on sleep and academic performance, Carskadon and her colleagues surveyed 3,000 high school students and found that those with higher grades reported sleeping more, going to bed earlier on school nights and sleeping in less on weekends than students who had lower grades.

Sleep is believed to reinforce learning and memory, with studies showing that people perform better on mental tasks when they are well-rested. “We hypothesize that when teens sleep, the brain is going through processes of consolidation — learning of experiences or making memories,” Yuan said. “It’s like your brain is filtering itself — consolidating the important things and filtering out those unimportant things.” When the brain is deprived of that opportunity, cognitive function suffers, along with the capacity to learn.

“It impacts academic performance. It’s harder to take tests and answer questions if you are sleep-deprived,” she said.

That’s why cramming, at the expense of sleep, is counter­productive, said Pelayo, who advises students: Don’t lose sleep to study, or you’ll lose out in the end.

The panic attack

Chloe Mauvais, 16, hit her breaking point at the end of a very challenging sophomore year when she reached “the depths of frustration and anxiety.” After months of late nights spent studying to keep up with academic demands, she suffered a panic attack one evening at home.

“I sat in the living room in our house on the ground, crying and having horrible breathing problems,” said the senior at Menlo-Atherton High School. “It was so scary. I think it was from the accumulated stress, the fear over my grades, the lack of sleep and the crushing sense of responsibility. High school is a very hard place to be.”

We hypothesize that when teens sleep, the brain is going through processes of consolidation — learning of experiences or making memories. It’s like your brain is filtering itself.

Where she once had good sleep habits, she had drifted into an unhealthy pattern of staying up late, sometimes until 3 a.m., researching and writing papers for her AP European history class and prepping for tests.

“I have difficulty remembering events of that year, and I think it’s because I didn’t get enough sleep,” she said. “The lack of sleep rendered me emotionally useless. I couldn’t address the stress because I had no coherent thoughts. I couldn’t step back and have perspective. … You could probably talk to any teen and find they reach their breaking point. You’ve pushed yourself so much and not slept enough and you just lose it.”

The experience was a kind of wake-up call, as she recognized the need to return to a more balanced life and a better sleep pattern, she said. But for some teens, this toxic mix of sleep deprivation, stress and anxiety, together with other external pressures, can tip their thinking toward dire solutions.

Research has shown that sleep problems among adolescents are a major risk factor for suicidal thoughts and death by suicide, which ranks as the third-leading cause of fatalities among 15- to 24-year-olds. And this link between sleep and suicidal thoughts remains strong, independent of whether the teen is depressed or has drug and alcohol issues, according to some studies.

“Sleep, especially deep sleep, is like a balm for the brain,” said Shashank Joshi, MD, associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford. “The better your sleep, the more clearly you can think while awake, and it may enable you to seek help when a problem arises. You have your faculties with you. You may think, ‘I have 16 things to do, but I know where to start.’ Sleep deprivation can make it hard to remember what you need to do for your busy teen life. It takes away the support, the infrastructure.”

Sleep is believed to help regulate emotions, and its deprivation is an underlying component of many mood disorders, such as anxiety, depression and bipolar disorder. For students who are prone to these disorders, better sleep can help serve as a buffer and help prevent a downhill slide, Joshi said.

Rebecca Bernert, PhD, who directs the Suicide Prevention Research Lab at Stanford, said sleep may affect the way in which teens process emotions. Her work with civilians and military veterans indicates that lack of sleep can make people more receptive to negative emotional information, which they might shrug off if they were fully rested, she said.

“Based on prior research, we have theorized that sleep disturbances may result in difficulty regulating emotional information, and this may lower the threshold for suicidal behaviors among at-risk individuals,” said Bernert, an instructor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences. Now she’s studying whether a brief nondrug treatment for insomnia reduces depression and risk for suicide.

Sleep deprivation also has been shown to lower inhibitions among both adults and teens. In the teen brain, the frontal lobe, which helps restrain impulsivity, isn’t fully developed, so teens are naturally prone to impulsive behavior. “When you throw into the mix sleep deprivation, which can also be disinhibiting, mood problems and the normal impulsivity of adolescence, then you have a potentially dangerous situation,” Joshi said.

Some schools shift

Given the health risks associated with sleep problems, school districts around the country have been looking at one issue over which they have some control: when school starts in the morning. The trend was set by the town of Edina, Minnesota, a well-to-do suburb of Minneapolis, which conducted a landmark experiment in student sleep in the late 1990s. It shifted the high school’s start time from 7:20 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. and then asked University of Minnesota researchers to look at the impact of the change. The researchers found some surprising results: Students reported feeling less depressed and less sleepy during the day and more empowered to succeed. There was no comparable improvement in student well-being in surrounding school districts where start times remained the same.

With these findings in hand, the entire Minneapolis Public School District shifted start times for 57,000 students at all of its schools in 1997 and found similarly positive results. Attendance rates rose, and students reported getting an hour’s more sleep each school night — or a total of five more hours of sleep a week — countering skeptics who argued that the students would respond by just going to bed later.

For the health and well-being of the nation, we should all be taking better care of our sleep, and we certainly should be taking better care of the sleep of our youth.

Other studies have reinforced the link between later start times and positive health benefits. One 2010 study at an independent high school in Rhode Island found that after delaying the start time by just 30 minutes, students slept more and showed significant improvements in alertness and mood. And a 2014 study in two counties in Virginia found that teens were much less likely to be involved in car crashes in a county where start times were later, compared with a county with an earlier start time.

Bolstered by the evidence, the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2014 issued a strong policy statement encouraging middle and high school districts across the country to start school no earlier than 8:30 a.m. to help preserve the health of the nation’s youth. Some districts have heeded the call, though the decisions have been hugely contentious, as many consider school schedules sacrosanct and cite practical issues, such as bus schedules, as obstacles.

In Fairfax County, Virginia, it took a decade of debate before the school board voted in 2014 to push back the opening school bell for its 57,000 students. And in Palo Alto, where a recent cluster of suicides has caused much communitywide soul-searching, the district superintendent issued a decision in the spring, over the strenuous objections of some teachers, students and administrators, to eliminate “zero period” for academic classes — an optional period that begins at 7:20 a.m. and is generally offered for advanced studies.

Certainly, changing school start times is only part of the solution, experts say. More widespread education about sleep and more resources for students are needed. Parents and teachers need to trim back their expectations and minimize pressures that interfere with teen sleep. And there needs to be a cultural shift, including a move to discourage late-night use of electronic devices, to help youngsters gain much-needed rest.

“At some point, we are going to have to confront this as a society,” Carskadon said. “For the health and well-being of the nation, we should all be taking better care of our sleep, and we certainly should be taking better care of the sleep of our youth.”

About Stanford Medicine

Stanford Medicine is an integrated academic health system comprising the Stanford School of Medicine and adult and pediatric health care delivery systems. Together, they harness the full potential of biomedicine through collaborative research, education and clinical care for patients. For more information, please visit med.stanford.edu .

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The Effects Homework Can Have On Teens’ Sleeping Habits

Jess Amabile '24 and February 25, 2021

Ever wonder why you feel like you never get enough sleep? Here’s a pretty good reason: large amounts of homework can be detrimental to a teen’s sleeping habits, even more so with high schoolers.

There have been many studies recently about the damage homework has to students’ health, mainly concerning lack of sleep in teenagers.  According to an article published by US News called “The Importance of Sleep for Teen Mental Health” , it states that “ surveys show that less than 9 percent of teens get enough sleep”.  This fact is devastating, especially considering the fact that teenagers take up about thirteen percent of the country’s population.  

Also mentioned in “The Importance of Sleep for Teen Mental Health” , “ about forty-one million Americans get six or fewer hours of sleep per night”.  If teenagers see their parents not getting enough sleep, it can convince them that there are things more important than sleep, such as something almost every teenager in America has to deal with–homework.

Homework is pretty stressful for teens, especially if they have other things to do.  Many teens have long hours at school, which limits the time for them to do their insane amount of homework, attend extra-curricular activities, eat, do whatever they need to around the house, and sleep.  And usually, sleeping is the last thing on the list of things to do before school the next day. Another article, “What’s preventing adequate teen sleep” , states that, “Homework is possibly the biggest factor that keeps teens from getting enough sleep…The sheer quantity of homework absorbs hours that should be dedicated to sleep”.  Students generally have so much homework that they don’t have enough time to do everything else they need to do that day.  So, sleeping is often the first thing teens eliminate from their schedule.  

According to Oxford Learning , homework can have other negative effects on students. In their article, Oxford Learning remarks, “56 percent of students considered homework a primary source of stress. Too much homework can result in lack of sleep, headaches, exhaustion, and weight loss”. 

 Similarly, Stanford Medicine News Center reports that the founder of the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic stated, “‘I think high school is the real danger spot in terms of sleep deprivation,’ said William Dement, MD, Ph.D.”.  Sleep deprivation is a real problem for high school students, and Stanford Medicine News Center continues on this topic by commenting, “Sleep deprivation increases the likelihood teens will suffer myriad negative consequences, including an inability to concentrate, poor grades, drowsy-driving incidents, anxiety, depression, thoughts of suicide and even suicide attempts. It’s a problem that knows no economic boundaries”. If students are constantly battling sleep deprivation, how can they concentrate on schoolwork, or even be able to perform everyday tasks?  This shows that homework greatly affects students in both mental and physical ways. If something is supposed to continue a lesson that was learned in school, why is it negatively affecting students’ lives?

Ask yourself: is homework really worth the extremely negative effects?

“What’s preventing adequate teen sleep”

http://sleepeducation.org/news/2017/07/26/what-is-preventing-adequate-teen-sleep

“The Importance of Sleep for Teen Mental Health”

https://health.usnews.com/health-care/for-better/articles/2018-07-02/the-importance-of-sleep-for-teen-mental-health

Oxford Learning

https://www.oxfordlearning.com/how-does-homework-affect-students/#:~:text=How%20Does%20Homework%20Affect%20Students,headaches%2C%20exhaustion%20and%20weight%20loss.

Stanford Medicine News Center

https://med.stanford.edu/news.html

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Self-report surveys of student sleep and well-being: a review of use in the context of school start times

• Terra D. Ziporyn, PhD Terra D. Ziporyn Correspondence Corresponding author. Contact Affiliations Start School Later, Inc, PO Box 6105, Annapolis, MD 21146 Search for articles by this author
• Beth A. Malow, MD, MS Beth A. Malow Affiliations Sleep Disorders Division, Department of Neurology, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, 1161 21st Ave South, Room A-0116 MCN,Nashville, TN 37232-2551 Search for articles by this author
• Kari Oakes, PA Kari Oakes Affiliations Start School Later, Inc, PO Box 6105, Annapolis, MD 21146 Search for articles by this author
• Kyla L. Wahlstrom, PhD Kyla L. Wahlstrom Affiliations Department of Organizational Leadership, Policy and Development, College of Education and Human Development, University of Minnesota, 210C Burton Hall, Minneapolis, MN 55455 Search for articles by this author
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Homework could have an impact on kids’ health. Should schools ban it?

Professor of Education, Penn State

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Gerald K. LeTendre has received funding from the National Science Foundation and the Spencer Foundation.

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Reformers in the Progressive Era (from the 1890s to 1920s) depicted homework as a “sin” that deprived children of their playtime . Many critics voice similar concerns today.

Yet there are many parents who feel that from early on, children need to do homework if they are to succeed in an increasingly competitive academic culture. School administrators and policy makers have also weighed in, proposing various policies on homework .

So, does homework help or hinder kids?

For the last 10 years, my colleagues and I have been investigating international patterns in homework using databases like the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) . If we step back from the heated debates about homework and look at how homework is used around the world, we find the highest homework loads are associated with countries that have lower incomes and higher social inequality.

Does homework result in academic success?

Let’s first look at the global trends on homework.

Undoubtedly, homework is a global phenomenon ; students from all 59 countries that participated in the 2007 Trends in Math and Science Study (TIMSS) reported getting homework. Worldwide, only less than 7% of fourth graders said they did no homework.

TIMSS is one of the few data sets that allow us to compare many nations on how much homework is given (and done). And the data show extreme variation.

For example, in some nations, like Algeria, Kuwait and Morocco, more than one in five fourth graders reported high levels of homework. In Japan, less than 3% of students indicated they did more than four hours of homework on a normal school night.

TIMSS data can also help to dispel some common stereotypes. For instance, in East Asia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan – countries that had the top rankings on TIMSS average math achievement – reported rates of heavy homework that were below the international mean.

In the Netherlands, nearly one out of five fourth graders reported doing no homework on an average school night, even though Dutch fourth graders put their country in the top 10 in terms of average math scores in 2007.

Going by TIMSS data, the US is neither “ A Nation at Rest” as some have claimed, nor a nation straining under excessive homework load . Fourth and eighth grade US students fall in the middle of the 59 countries in the TIMSS data set, although only 12% of US fourth graders reported high math homework loads compared to an international average of 21%.

So, is homework related to high academic success?

At a national level, the answer is clearly no. Worldwide, homework is not associated with high national levels of academic achievement .

But, the TIMSS can’t be used to determine if homework is actually helping or hurting academic performance overall , it can help us see how much homework students are doing, and what conditions are associated with higher national levels of homework.

We have typically found that the highest homework loads are associated with countries that have lower incomes and higher levels of social inequality – not hallmarks that most countries would want to emulate.

Impact of homework on kids

TIMSS data also show us how even elementary school kids are being burdened with large amounts of homework.

Almost 10% of fourth graders worldwide (one in 10 children) reported spending multiple hours on homework each night. Globally, one in five fourth graders report 30 minutes or more of homework in math three to four times a week.

These reports of large homework loads should worry parents, teachers and policymakers alike.

Empirical studies have linked excessive homework to sleep disruption , indicating a negative relationship between the amount of homework, perceived stress and physical health.

What constitutes excessive amounts of homework varies by age, and may also be affected by cultural or family expectations. Young adolescents in middle school, or teenagers in high school, can study for longer duration than elementary school children.

But for elementary school students, even 30 minutes of homework a night, if combined with other sources of academic stress, can have a negative impact . Researchers in China have linked homework of two or more hours per night with sleep disruption .

Even though some cultures may normalize long periods of studying for elementary age children, there is no evidence to support that this level of homework has clear academic benefits . Also, when parents and children conflict over homework, and strong negative emotions are created, homework can actually have a negative association with academic achievement.

Should there be “no homework” policies?

Administrators and policymakers have not been reluctant to wade into the debates on homework and to formulate policies . France’s president, Francois Hollande, even proposed that homework be banned because it may have inegaliatarian effects.

However, “zero-tolerance” homework policies for schools, or nations, are likely to create as many problems as they solve because of the wide variation of homework effects. Contrary to what Hollande said, research suggests that homework is not a likely source of social class differences in academic achievement .

Homework, in fact, is an important component of education for students in the middle and upper grades of schooling.

Policymakers and researchers should look more closely at the connection between poverty, inequality and higher levels of homework. Rather than seeing homework as a “solution,” policymakers should question what facets of their educational system might impel students, teachers and parents to increase homework loads.

At the classroom level, in setting homework, teachers need to communicate with their peers and with parents to assure that the homework assigned overall for a grade is not burdensome, and that it is indeed having a positive effect.

Perhaps, teachers can opt for a more individualized approach to homework. If teachers are careful in selecting their assignments – weighing the student’s age, family situation and need for skill development – then homework can be tailored in ways that improve the chance of maximum positive impact for any given student.

I strongly suspect that when teachers face conditions such as pressure to meet arbitrary achievement goals, lack of planning time or little autonomy over curriculum, homework becomes an easy option to make up what could not be covered in class.

Whatever the reason, the fact is a significant percentage of elementary school children around the world are struggling with large homework loads. That alone could have long-term negative consequences for their academic success.

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How Does Homework Affect Students Sleep?

Published: June 21st, 2023

Exploring how homework affects students' sleep is an essential part of understanding the overall health and academic performance of our youth. The correlation between heavy workload from assignments and sleep deprivation has been a subject of multiple studies, with compelling findings.

Understanding the correlation between homework and teenage stress

Exploring the impact on quality sleep due to excessive homework, how late-night study impacts the circadian rhythm, the link between disturbed sleep patterns and academic performance, unpacking research findings linking heavy homework load with mental health issues, implications for future educational policies regarding home-based tasks, evaluating pros & cons related to assigning extensive workloads at elementary levels, suggesting alternatives for effective learning without compromising children's wellbeing, alfie kohn's perspective on education system practices, proposing changes toward balanced school schedules, assessing potential benefits shifting school start times based upon nsf recommendations, effective time management strategies, the impact of sleep deprivation on students, does homework affect sleep schedules, what percentage of students lose sleep due to homework, why does school cause sleep deprivation, why is sleep more important than homework.

This blog post delves into the impact that excessive homework can have on high school students' quality sleep, and how it might disrupt their natural circadian rhythm or sleep cycle. We will also explore its implications on mental health issues among younger kids who are often encouraged to go to bed earlier but struggle due to late-night study sessions.

The role of American education system practices in contributing to student's lack of adequate rest will be examined along with Alfie Kohn’s perspective about current education policies. Additionally, we'll discuss early school start times as another potential burden leading towards disturbed sleeping patterns.

Finally, we aim at proposing some changes for more balanced school schedules and providing tips for effectively managing time amidst academic responsibilities and extracurricular activities without being sleep deprived.

The Impact of Homework on Teenage Stress and Sleep

Homework is a major source of stress for teenagers, affecting their sleep patterns. According to studies, about 75% of high school students report grades and homework as significant stressors. This anxiety can lead to sleep deprivation, with over 50% of students reporting insufficient rest.

A heavy workload not only affects academic performance but also disrupts the normal sleep cycle. The pressure to excel academically leads many students into a vicious cycle where they stay up late completing tasks, wake up early for school, and end up being sleep deprived.

This lack of rest impairs cognitive functions like memory retention and problem-solving skills - both crucial for academic success. Furthermore, inadequate sleep may lead to ailments such as reduced immunity or persistent tiredness.

Sleep experts recommend that younger kids should go to bed earlier than teens because their biological clock naturally prompts them to feel sleepy around 8-9 PM. However, this becomes challenging when burdened with loads of assignments which extend their screen time significantly beyond recommended limits.

The blue light emitted by electronic devices used for studying suppresses melatonin production - a hormone that regulates our body's internal clock determining when we feel sleepy or awake (National Sleep Foundation). Consequently, these factors combined make falling asleep more difficult leading towards disrupted sleeping patterns ultimately affecting overall well-being including mental health status alongside academic performance negatively.

In conclusion, there needs to be an urgent reevaluation of how much work is assigned outside class hours considering potential adverse effects upon student's health, especially concerning adequate rest necessary for optimal functioning throughout day-to-day activities, whether within academia or other extracurricular responsibilities undertaken during leisure periods post-school schedules.

Analyzing Sleep Patterns Among Stressed Students

High schoolers are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of sleep deprivation due to the demands of juggling academics and extracurriculars. The pressure of balancing academics with extracurricular activities can lead to late nights and early mornings, leaving them feeling perpetually tired and impacting their academic performance.

The human body operates on a 24-hour internal clock known as the circadian rhythm. This biological process regulates our sleep-wake cycle, among other things. When students stay up late studying or completing homework, they disrupt this natural rhythm which can result in a range of health issues including chronic fatigue and weakened immunity.

Screen time is another factor that exacerbates this issue. Many students use electronic devices for research or writing assignments before bed, exposing themselves to blue light which further interferes with their circadian rhythms.

Regular slumber is a must for cognitive functions, such as memory consolidation and problem-solving aptitude - fundamental aspects of learning. Multiple studies have shown that when these patterns are disturbed due to excessive homework or late-night study sessions, it can negatively affect academic performance.

• Poor Concentration: Lack of adequate rest makes focusing on tasks more difficult, leading to decreased productivity during study hours.
• Inability To Retain Information: During deep stages of sleep, information from short-term memory gets transferred into long-term storage enabling better recall later; deprived individuals miss out on this critical process.
• Deteriorating Mental Health: Chronic lack of rest has been linked with increased levels of anxiety and depression amongst teenagers, impacting overall wellbeing and indirectly affecting grades too.

A report by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) suggests there's an urgent need for schools to address these concerns seriously, considering the potential repercussions over students' physical and mental health alongside scholastic achievements. Making sure they get enough quality rest each night is essential for optimal functioning throughout the day, both inside and outside the classroom environments.

Investigating Time Spent on Homework and Its Effects on Mental Health

The amount of time spent on homework and studying significantly affects students' mental health. Multiple studies have shown that an excessive workload can lead to depression, stress, and sleep deprivation .

A comprehensive study involving 2386 adolescents assessed various aspects, including self-rated health, overweight status, and depression symptoms, alongside time spent on homework/studying. The researchers used ten different multiple linear regression models to test the association with the global Kutcher Adolescent Depression Scale score. This approach allowed them to analyze how each aspect correlates with the others.

The results were revealing: there was a clear correlation between increased hours dedicated to home-based tasks and higher levels of depressive tendencies among high school students . These effects weren't limited only to academic performance but extended into their personal lives as well, affecting relationships, participation rates in extracurricular activities , and more.

This data suggests that we need a more balanced approach when it comes to assigning workloads at schools. Instead of piling up assignments indiscriminately, educators should aim for an optimal balance where learning is enhanced rather than hindered by excessive amounts of homework.

In light of this information, some countries are already taking steps towards reducing screen time requirements, especially during after-school hours. This allows younger kids to go to bed earlier, improving their sleep cycle quality significantly, which ultimately leads to better cognitive functioning the next day at school or other engagements they might have outside the academic context, like part-time jobs or family duties.

To sum up, a healthy balance between academic and other life obligations is essential to avoid potential repercussions in all aspects of a student's life. Neglecting to strike a balance between academic and other responsibilities can have severe repercussions, not only in terms of grades but also emotionally, socially, and mentally. Therefore, it is imperative to address this issue promptly and effectively with all stakeholders involved in the education sector worldwide today, tomorrow, and onwards too.

Excessive Workload Strain from Assignments in Younger Kids

The ongoing discussion about the implications of homework for younger students has drawn attention from educators, parents, and researchers. While assignments can reinforce what students learn during school hours, evidence supporting benefits from home-based tasks remains scarce before high-school levels. This is concerning considering the potential adverse effects an excessive workload can have on young minds.

On one hand, homework can instill discipline and help develop good study habits. On the other hand, too much of it could lead to sleep deprivation among younger kids who should ideally be going to bed earlier. The AAP suggests that 6-12 year olds should have 9-12 hours of rest, however this can be hard to attain when they are inundated with assignments.

Besides affecting their sleep cycle, overburdening them with academic responsibilities also leaves little room for extracurricular activities which play a crucial role in their overall development. It may even result in screen time replacing physical activity as children turn towards digital platforms to complete their assignments.

Rather than piling up work indiscriminately, schools could consider adopting strategies aimed at enhancing learning while ensuring the well-being of students. For instance, project-based learning could be an effective alternative where students actively explore real-world problems and challenges, thereby gaining deeper knowledge.

In addition to this approach would be limiting daily homework duration per grade level or introducing "homework-free" days during weekends or holidays providing ample rest periods essential for growth development amongst younger kids.

This shift not only ensures that our future generations aren't sleep deprived due to unnecessary academic pressure but also fosters a love for lifelong learning - something far more valuable than mere grades obtained through rote memorization.

American Education's Role In Student Sleep Deprivation

It's common for students in the US to be sleep deprived , not just because of academic pressures but also due to extracurricular activities . Late nights and early mornings disrupt a healthy sleep cycle , affecting student wellbeing.

Educational critic Alfie Kohn argues that the American education system emphasizes homework without considering its impact on student wellbeing. Many tasks assigned do not enhance learning but rather contribute towards stress and sleep deprivation among students. You can read more about his thoughts in his article titled " The Truth About Homework: Needless Assignments Persist Because of Widespread Misconceptions About Learning. "

Kohn suggests a shift towards assigning work aimed at enhancing learning rather than piling it up indiscriminately. Schools should recognize the importance of adequate rest for optimal functioning.

• Reduce homework loads: Lightening the load could help alleviate some of the pressure students feel, allowing them time to relax and get enough sleep each night.
• Consider late start times: Multiple studies suggest that starting school later in the morning could have numerous benefits including improved attendance rates and higher alertness, reducing instances of depressive tendencies significantly. (National Sleep Foundation (NSF))
• Promote good sleep hygiene: Schools can educate students about good sleep habits such as maintaining consistent bedtimes and wake-up times, limiting screen time before bedtime, and creating quiet, dark sleeping environments.

The key takeaway here is balance - between academics, extracurricular activities, family responsibilities, and personal downtime - which includes getting sufficient restful sleep every night.

Early School Start Times - An Additional Burden

Many adolescents in the US are finding that having to get up at sunrise is more of an encumbrance than a blessing. Parents and educators alike have reported that these early start times are inhibiting productivity throughout daytime schedules.

The National Sleep Foundation (NSF), an organization dedicated to improving health and well-being through sleep education and advocacy, suggests shifting school timings as one possible solution. This adjustment could result in improved attendance rates along with higher alertness among students during class hours.

The NSF study indicated that adjusting the school start time from 7:30 AM to 8:30 AM produced tangible improvements in student performance. The extra hour allowed teenagers' natural sleep cycle to align better with their academic schedule leading them to feel less sleep deprived.

• Better Attendance: Schools noted fewer tardies and absences after implementing later start times.
• Increase In Grades: Students showed improvement in core subjects like Math and English.
• Mental Health Benefits: A decrease was observed in instances of depressive tendencies significantly among students.

This shift not only helped improve academic outcomes but also had positive effects on mental health as teens were able to get adequate rest without having to sacrifice extracurricular activities or family duties.

The idea of starting schools later isn't new; however, its implementation has been slow due largely because changing such ingrained societal norms takes time. But if we want our younger kids performing optimally while avoiding unnecessary strain caused by excessive workload or screen time then we need to rethink how we structure our day-to-day lives. Research has demonstrated that inadequate rest can detrimentally affect our health and wellness, so it is essential to ensure we are getting enough sleep by retiring earlier and limiting screen time before bed.

Balancing Academic Responsibilities With Other Duties

As a student, you're expected to juggle academic responsibilities with other duties. Yet, it can be a challenge to effectively manage such a hectic schedule. Homework alone can take up to four hours a day, and that's not counting extracurricular activities or part-time jobs. So, how can you manage your time effectively amidst these multifarious responsibilities?

The key to managing your diverse obligations lies in effective time management strategies . Here are some tips that could help:

• Prioritize tasks: Not all assignments are created equal. Some require more effort and attention than others. Prioritizing your work can help you focus on what's most important first.
• Create a schedule: Having a set routine for studying can make it easier to stick to your commitments and avoid procrastination.
• Leverage technology: There are numerous apps available designed specifically for helping students manage their workload efficiently.
• Avoid multitasking: Multitasking often leads to mistakes and decreased productivity. Rather than attempting to juggle multiple tasks, give your full attention to one task until it is finished before progressing onto the next.

Sleep deprivation among high school students is a serious issue that needs urgent addressing. Multiple studies reveal that the majority of teenagers receive only six to eight hours of sleep per night despite needing more for optimal functioning. This lack of sleep not only affects academic performance but also overall health and wellbeing.

In addition, extracurricular activities and screen time can also affect younger kids' sleep cycle. The American education system has been criticized for promoting this unhealthy trend by assigning excessive amounts of homework without considering individual capacities or needs.

To combat this problem, parents need support from schools in ensuring children go to bed earlier while limiting their exposure to electronic devices during evening hours. This can significantly improve the quality of rest received each night, reducing instances of depressive tendencies associated with inadequate slumber patterns amongst adolescents today.

FAQs in Relation to How Does Homework Affect Students Sleep

Yes, excessive homework can lead to late-night studying, causing students to have inadequate sleep.

Around 56% of students reported losing sleep over schoolwork according to a Stanford study .

Schools may contribute to students' sleep deprivation through early start times and heavy academic loads.

Sleep is crucial for cognitive functions , including memory consolidation which aids in learning; overworking could hinder these processes.

Is Homework Ruining Your Sleep?

Excessive homework can negatively impact students' mental and physical health, leading to stress and lack of sleep.

Teachers can help by coordinating assignment deadlines and exploring alternatives like home-based tasks for younger children.

It's important for educators to recognize the effects of heavy academic loads on student productivity and well-being.

According to a study by the National Sleep Foundation, teenagers need 8-10 hours of sleep per night to function at their best.

Don't let homework rob you of your Z's - prioritize your health and well-being!

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The relation among sleep duration, homework burden, and sleep hygiene in chinese school-aged children

Affiliation.

• 1 a Department of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics Shanghai Children's Medical Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine , Shanghai , People's Republic of China.
• PMID: 24188543
• DOI: 10.1080/15402002.2013.825837

Insufficient sleep in school-aged children is common in modern society, with homework burden being a potential risk factor. The aim of this article is to explore the effect of sleep hygiene on the association between homework and sleep duration. Children filled out the Chinese version of the Adolescent Sleep Hygiene Scale, and parents filled out a sociodemographic questionnaire. The final sample included 363 boys and 371 girls with a mean age of 10.82 ± 0.38 years. Children with more homework went to bed later and slept less. Better sleep hygiene was associated with earlier bedtimes and longer sleep duration. Findings suggest that homework burden had a larger effect on sleep duration than sleep hygiene. Fifth-grade children in Shanghai have an excessive homework burden, which overwrites the benefit of sleep hygiene on sleep duration.

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• Sleep and children: the impact of lack of sleep on daily life

Yawning and drowsiness are not the only signs that a student is getting too little sleep. Other symptoms put forward by research include hyperactivity, crankiness, impulsiveness, and a short attention span. Sleep loss also has less obvious effects on health, emotions, academic success, and driving ability. These effects have long-term consequences in the educational setting but also for healthy living and skill development outside school.

Sleep and school

Sleep has beneficial effects on our health, emotions, memory, and academic potential. Inadequate sleep, however, can negatively affect our well-being, decision-making, and attention, all of which are necessary for success in school. Elementary school and early high school have been identified as critical periods for affecting and establishing healthy habits in children. Because of sleep’s vital impact on the health and performance of students, it is important to emphasize good bedtime habits in our homes, communities, and especially in our schools during this time.

As a society, we are sleeping less and less. One in four Canadians is sleep-deprived and 60–70% of Canadian students are often very sleepy during their morning classes. School-aged children are experiencing delayed bedtimes and nearly half of Canadian teens reported at least occasional problems falling or staying asleep.

Night time difficulties have become common and are hindering the ability of students to thrive in school. Twenty to forty percent of young children are estimated to have sleep problems and of approximately two million Canadians between the ages of 14 and 18 years, as many as 975,000 suffer from a serious lack of sleep. On top of that, almost 13% of teenagers are experiencing severe insomnia. Lost sleep on weeknights combined with unhealthy bedtime habits on weekends are triggering difficulties that manifest during the school week.

Reducing sleep may disrupt the ability of students to concentrate for long periods of time, and remember what they learn in class. According to a study , children with reduced sleep are more likely to struggle with verbal creativity, problem solving, inhibiting their behaviour, and generally score lower on IQ tests according to current leading research.

The consequences on school performance are evident. Up to 24% of teenage students have reported that their grades dropped because of sleepiness. In addition, a study has shown that students who had grades of C, D, or E averaged 25 to 30 minutes less sleep per weeknight than their classmates who achieved A’s or B’s.

Sleep and sociocultural environment

The consequences of poor sleep may be long term. Just as nutrition and exercise must be included in healthy lifestyle choices, sleep habits must also be considered in this balance. This requires prioritizing our sleep needs within school, family, and community settings. When choosing how to balance our cultural and personal commitments with our sleep requirements, it is helpful to remember that sleep is an important factor for performing at our best physically, mentally, and emotionally. When we put off sleep to study or to practice a skill, we may actually be preventing our mind from absorbing the information we want it to retain or our bodies from developing as we had hoped.

Another factor to be considered with evening activities is how much they stimulate a child. Although physical activity during the day is healthy for sleep, our bodies need time to cool down after exercise. Similarly, our minds need time to settle down after activities that require deep concentration. In addition, the stress of performing well, whether it be in an organized activity or a social context, may keep us from falling asleep easily if it occurs too close to bedtime.

Homework may affect a child’s sleep in three ways. First, the time it takes to finish an assignment may infringe on time that should be used for sleeping. Second, work done too close to bedtime may leave a child too stimulated to fall asleep easily. Finally, if homework is done on or near a child’s bed, the child may associate that area with working or stress and not be able to fall asleep easily there.

Home entertainment and technology

Watching television, movies, or video games close to bedtime may all contribute to a loss of sleep. Although we may feel and appear calm when enjoying these types of entertainment, our minds are excited. If we don’t have enough downtime before going to bed, it may be difficult to fall asleep. Further, children engaging in content that is inappropriate for their age may make it difficult for them to sleep as they can get anxious or scared. Such content may increase the chance of nightmares during the night as well. Finally, using entertainment technology too close to bedtime may lead to using these devices after we should already be in bed.

Eating Habits

A heavy meal right before bedtime can make it difficult to sleep. On the other hand, going to bed on an empty stomach can do the same thing, so finding a balance is necessary.

Caffeine is a stimulant found in many items such as chocolate, chocolate milk, tea, iced tea, soft drinks, coffee, some herbal remedies, and many over-the-counter pain and cold medicines. Caffeine can help us function during the day, but it may also cause problems sleeping at night.

Tobacco and alcohol

Although consuming alcohol may make us fall asleep easier at first, it acts as a stimulant as it gets digested which may cause us to wake up throughout the night and intensify or create sleep disorders. Similarly, smoking may worsen many sleep disorders and can cause others such as restless leg syndrome and sleep disordered breathing.

Sleep and health

Several physiological functions are strongly affected by insufficient sleep:

• The regulation of the neurohormones leptin and ghrelin
• The control of glucose level, increasing children’s risk of diabetes
• The control of cardiovascular function

These are key risk factors for the development of obesity.

It has been found that not getting enough sleep is related to the development of childhood obesity in Quebec. Children whose parents have weight problems have a much greater chance of developing weight problems themselves. This could be the result of genetics or of having learned poor eating habits from their parents. Like eating habits, sleep habits are closely related to a family’s lifestyle, and it has been shown that many children sleep less than they need. This is important because short sleep duration produces hormonal changes comparable to those associated with increased risks of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension.

Sleep and Driving

Many studies have shown that reduced sleep impairs a teenager’s driving ability. Car crashes are more frequent in young drivers that sleep less than 7 hours a night compared to those that get more. Other research concludes that teenagers are more at risk if they have poor sleep quality, daytime sleepiness, or drive late at night. This is a major issue with adolescents who are learning to drive, are regularly sleep-deprived, and are experimenting with alcohol.

This content was developped by Reut Gruber, PhD, thanks to the support of Manulife.

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Craig Canapari, MD

Proven advice for better sleep in kids and parents

Homework vs. Sleep: A Cause of Stress in Teens (And Younger Kids)

Posted on August 31, 2015 by Craig Canapari M.D.

Homework stresses kids out; there is no way around this fact. The combination of heavy homework loads and early school start times is a major cause of sleep deprivation and consequent stress in teens, but this can be a problem even in younger kids.

When we moved to Connecticut, I was struck by the perception of some parents that my son’s classmates that he and his peers were not getting enough homework. I was shocked; these kids were in first grade at the time.  Fortunately, my son’s teacher have resisted this pressure.

When I started looking into the evidence,  I was surprised to find that there is not much evidence that homework before high school benefits children.  I really love this article by Justin Coulson, a parenting expert and psychologist, detailing why he bans his school age children from doing homework , concluding from the evidence that homework does more harm than good. A recent study showed that some elementary school children had three times the recommended homework load . In spite of this, homework has started appearing even in kindergarten and the first great in spite of recommendations to the contrary. This has become a source of great stress to families.

Sleep deprivation in teenagers is an epidemic here in the US, with up to 90% of teenagers not getting enough sleep on school nights . The most important factor causing this is school start times that are too early for teenagers, who are hardwired to go to bed later and get up later compared with younger children (or grown-ups, for that matter). I’ve discussed this at length on my blog .

Another factor which can cause sleep deprivation is homework. Some studies suggest that the amount of homework which teenagers receive has stayed constant over time. I don’t pretend to be an educational expert, but I frequently see children and teenagers who have hours and hours of homework every night. This seems most common in teenagers who are striving to get into competitive colleges. This is piled on top of multiple extracurricular activities– sports, clubs, music lessons, and public service. Of course, the patients and families I see in clinic tend to be the people with the greatest difficulties with sleep. So I decided to look into this issue a bit more.

How common is excessive homework, anyway?

The recommendation of the National Education Association is that children received no more than ten minutes of homework per grade level. So a high school senior would max out at two hours of homework per night. An analysis published by the Brookings Institute concluded that there has been little change in the amount of homework assigned between 1984 and 2012 . About 15% of juniors and seniors did have greater than two hours of homework per night. Interestingly, the author also referenced a study which showed that about 15% of parents were concerned about excessive homework as well. This would suggest that the problem of excessive homework is occurring only in about one in six teenagers.

There is a perception that homework loads are excessive. This certainly may be the case in some communities or in high pressure schools. Teenagers certainly think that they have too much homework; here is a well researched piece written by a teenager  who questions the utility of large amounts of homework.

Some generalities emerge from the educational research :

• Older students get more homework than younger students
• Race may play a role, with Asian students doing more homework
• Less experienced teachers assign more homework
• Math classes are the classes most likely to assign homework

How beneficial is homework?

The US is a relatively homework intense country, but does not score as well as countries where homework is less common. In high school age kids, homework does have benefits. However, 70 minutes total seems to be the sweet spot in terms of benefits ; homework in excess of this amount is associated with decreasing test scores.

Homework clearly can have benefits– development of good organizational habits, review of materials, and improving skills such as reading and critical thinking. Homework should be assigned, however, with the goal of helping children learning, not because the teacher or school has decided that a certain amount should be assigned nightly, or because some parents want their children to get more  homework. Alfie Kohn, an educational leader and a big critic of homework. published a great article on rethinking homework . Here’s another thoughtful perspective on homework by a history teacher named Glen Whitman.

When To Worry About Excessive Homework

Obviously, I am not an educational expert. My review of this topic suggests that most children do not have an undue burden of homework. Thus, the best way to help teenagers get more sleep is to start school later . However, there are a subset of teenagers who may have an excessive amount of homework. I would define that is over two hours of homework a night, or an amount of homework that keeps children up late at night with regularity, especially given that getting enough sleep is critical for learning. No child should have to regularly decide between homework and sleep.  These factors can contribute to excessive homework:

• Unreasonable amounts of assigned homework (10 minutes/grade level)
• Excessive extracurricular activities leading to a late homework start time
• Learning problems such as ADHD or dyslexia, especially if they have not yet been diagnosed.

Some final advice:

• Teenagers:  If you cannot get your homework done at night without staying up past ten or eleven on school nights, please talk to your parents about this. They can help you. Also, recognize that there are diminishing returns; I got the worst grade I ever got in college on a biochemistry exam after pulling my one and only all-nighter. Going to sleep earlier on the night before a test might be more beneficial than sacrificing sleep to study.
• Parents: Be conscious of how late your teens are staying up and how much time they are spending on their homework. If it seems excessive, please review your child’s schedule with him or her, and have a frank conversation with your child’s teachers.
• Educators:  Ask your students how long they are spending on homework. If they seem sleepy in class, talk about this issue with them and  their parents. Try to make sure that the culture of your school is such that homework is assigned for clear educational benefits, and not simply for the sake of doing so.

I would love to hear your perspectives on these issues. Of course, to paraphrase “Bones” McCoy , “I’m a sleep doctor, not a teacher.” However, if I was asking my patients to do a nightly treatment that required an hour or more of their time, I would have to be absolutely sure that it was helpful. I’m not convinced that homework meets that standard.  Do I have this issue all wrong? Let me know in the comments.  Is the homework load excessive in your town? I would love to hear.

You May Also Be Interested In...

• Lack of Sleep is A Cause of Childhood Obesity
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Homework: The Cause of Sleep Deprivation? Or is it More Than That?

Michelle Galdi , Chief Editor | January 26, 2019

A typical day at Park Ridge High School consists of sitting in various classrooms from 7:45 to 2:44. However, school carries on much longer than those designated times.

Students are constantly preoccupied with homework after school, and, to delve into just how much work students have, I interviewed Sandra Ortega, Alex Uva, Isabella Wise, Susie Rubenstein, and Josh Zdanowicz about the after-school obligations that consume their time, like homework.

All students stated that they feel like they have too much homework, taking an average of 3-4 hours to complete

All students stated that they feel like they have too much homework, taking an average of 3-4 hours to complete. Sandra said that the bulk of her homework comes from her Calculus, Anatomy and French classes. Considering all of those classes are Honors courses, it is reasonable that the homework requirement would be considerable. Additionally, AP classes often prove to be even harder, considering they are similar to college level classes. Alex’s AP English and AP European History homework takes him the longest, along with Susie’s AP Psychology class. Even without the added expectations of Honors and AP courses, students are still preoccupied with other time-consuming activities.

Along with homework, students juggle additional obligations after school, including sports and clubs. Izzy told me that she is “a dancer and an assistant dance teacher” so she “is always at the studio for an hour, then [goes] home to eat dinner, then [goes] back to dance for another 3 hours.” Her long day of dance finally finishes around 10:30 when she gets home and starts her homework. Josh is one of the many students who participate in school sports. He stated that, “during cross country season, it was impossible to get homework done.” When he got home from practice, all he wanted to do was go to bed, unmotivated to do any work. However, sometimes obligations do not always revolve around sports. Everyday after school, Sandra has to pick up her younger sister and her friends from school and she has work occasionally, which tends to eat up her time. Sports, homework, family, and work responsibilities tend to pile up on students.

Similar to the data provided by the Nationwide Children’s hospital, the majority of Park Ridge High School receive between six and eight hours of sleep.

As a result of staying up late to complete their daily tasks, students lose precious hours of sleep. According to the Nationwide Children’s Hospital, teenagers need between nine and nine and a half hours of sleep. However, teenagers only get an average of 7 hours. Investigating further in this statistic, I reached out to a random sample of students and recorded their average hours of sleep over a few days. Similar to the data provided by the Nationwide Children’s hospital, the majority of Park Ridge High School receive between six and eight hours of sleep.

Being sleep deprived can lead to feeling incredibly irritable and tired the next day. Additionally, if a lack of sleep continues, it can affect one’s overall health, making them susceptible to serious medical conditions like obesity, heart disease, and high blood pressure. Sleep is one of the most important things for developing teens. So, how could this conflict be resolved?

I asked the students what they think should be done to change the issue of having too much responsibilities. A few weeks ago, myself and a few of my classmates had to take four tests in one day, resulting in us staying up late in order to study. Sandra, one of my classmates who had to take those four tests, wished that, “teachers [would] coordinate better with each other when they are giving large assignments or tests. The lack of this can cause scheduling issues.” One of those four tests was taken in Mr. Wilson’s Anatomy Honors class, so I spoke to him about the issue. He stated that “kids need to be their own advocates.” If they notice that a bunch of assignments or tests are racking up on their schedules, they need to reach out to their teachers and let them know of their other obligations. If they fail to do so, then it is no longer the teacher’s fault, but that of the student. Izzy came up with the suggestion that homework being optional if you understand what is going on in a class. However, she argued that “if you are struggling with the material, it should be mandatory.” These alternatives might possibly be able to solve some of the problems with homework.

Kids need to be their own advocates.

— Mr. Wilson, Science Teacher

On the other hand, the problem does not solely sit in the issue of homework. Mr. Wilson argued that “time management comes into play,” since students, “wait until the last second to complete things, instead of doing it in small increments over a longer time.” Additionally, “kids feel like they have to join all the clubs and sports.” He stated that there are just too many things going on and so many plates to juggle, eventually something is going to drop. To help solve the overall problem of not only having too much homework, but also the time that sports and clubs consume, Mr. Wilson thinks that having a block schedule can alleviate some of the conflict. Whether the issue is homework or sports, students and teachers both agree that there is a problem. Time management is a large factor that impacts students sleeping time and performance in school. Solutions like homework being more optional, teachers coordinating the scheduling of projects and tests, students advocating for themselves, and block scheduling can all be effective.

• Block Schedule
• Sleep Deprivation
• Time Management

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Grace Booras • Jan 24, 2020 at 12:49 pm

Despite homework being useful for practice, middle school students should not have homework. Studies show that homework reduces the amount of physical activity for students, the scold of not doing homework is stressful and frustrating, and students do not get enough sleep at night. First of all, homework reduces the amount of physical activity for students. Too much homework given to students can result in lack of sleep at night, headaches daily, exhaustion, and weight loss. Excessive homework can also result in poor eating habits, which can result in weight loss. According to a school psychiatrist in Oregon, “a low amount of physical activity can result in a change in behavior in a teen, and even make them more disrespectful.” If students are stuck inside, sitting at a desk, staring down at the same paper for hours on end, they can’t have any time or motivation for outside physical activities. Physical activity can also help reduce health problems when the kids are older. The article “Kids need more exercise, less homework” says: “When people ask me, ‘What’s the biggest thing I can do to avoid dementia?’ my answer is ‘exercise,’” said Margaret Gatz, a professor of psychology at USC who has published studies on the connection between diabetes diagnoses in middle age and later Alzheimer’s diagnosis. This shows that not having homework would give students more time to be physical and stay active. Second, the scold of not doing homework is stressful and frustrating for students. Because kids have outside of school activities and are being scolded for not doing homework, when in fact they have other things they need to do, they are missing out on physical and emotional connections. According to the child psychologist Kenneth Barish, “battles over homework rarely result in an improvement in school.” She proved that students and parents argue over doing homework, which can stress both parties out and create tension in families. Parents scold their children for not doing homework, and then the teacher scolds them. Teachers and parents scolding students can make them feel bad about themselves and reduce the want to learn. “It’s disrespectful to tell me that you don’t have time for homework. You can find the time.” Says the teacher. This can make the students feel pressured to cancel after school activities and make them feel stressed out and busy all the time. According to a study done at Stanford University, “56 percent of students considered homework a primary source of stress.” The hours spent everyday in classes plus the hours spent doing homework leads to students feeling overwhelmed and unmotivated. Homework can help students with time management, but it also teaches them to worry and stress about things. When students are stressed out, it can lower their grade, and cause them to zone out during class. Last of all, students don’t get enough sleep at night due to staying up late doing homework. “All students stated that they feel like they have too much homework, taking an average of 3-4 hours to complete.” (Homework: The Cause Of Sleep Deprivation) In the 2006 pole, it has been shown that 80% of middle school students don’t get enough sleep at night because of staying up doing homework, and at least 28% fall asleep in school. Students all over America stay up for hours on end trying to finish their homework. Studies show that Middle school students should get no less than 9 ½ hours of sleep per night. “Similar to the data provided by the Nationwide Children’s hospital, the majority of Park Ridge High School receive between six and eight hours of sleep.” The amount of homework that kids have has increased by 11% since the 1990’s. With 6 different classes to try and juggle, taking home their work is stressful; students need breaks. A student once said “If I can’t sleep at school, then I shouldn’t have to do school work at home.” Even though homework can help students practice the skills they are learning in their classes, students should not lose sleep, lose physical activity, or be stressed out over so much homework at a young age.

This is my essay I am writing for my language arts class. I do agree that homework can be useful in many situations, but I do stand by my point in saying that if you can’t sleep at school and do the things you do at home at school, then you should have to do SCHOOLwork at home 🙂

Cench • Jan 28, 2019 at 1:36 pm

Hi! I’m interested to see how many students have their devices near them and check social media, answer texts, etc. while they are doing homework. I agree with Mr. Wilson that especially in PR, students over commit and overwhelm themselves being involved in too much. Lack of sleep is caused by more than homework and school activities. Many students have expressed they have a hard time actually falling asleep – most likely due to over stimulation of the brain with devices prior to going to bed, binge watching shows or gaming. How long would homework take without distractions? Just a thought 🙂

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Why You Should Make a Good Night’s Sleep a Priority

Poor sleep habits and sleep deprivation are serious problems for most high school and college students. This guide offers important tips on how—and why—to improve your sleep hygiene.

The time you spend in high school and college can be both fun and rewarding. At the same time, these can be some of the busiest years of your life.

Balancing all the demands on your time—a full course load, extracurricular activities, and socializing with friends—can be challenging. And if you also work or have family commitments, it can feel like there just aren’t enough hours in the day. 

With so many competing priorities, sacrificing sleep may feel like the only way to get everything done. 

Despite the sleepiness you might feel the next day, one late night probably won’t have a major impact on your well-being. But regularly short-changing yourself on quality sleep can have serious implications for school, work, and your physical and mental health.

Alternatively, prioritizing a regular sleep schedule can make these years healthier, less stressful, and more successful long-term.

The sleep you need versus the sleep you get

According to the National Sleep Foundation , high school students (ages 14-17) need about eight to 10 hours of sleep each night. For young adults (ages 18 to 25), the range is need between seven and nine hours.

How do you know how much sleep you need within this range? 

According to Dr. Edward Pace-Schott, Harvard Summer School and Harvard Medical School faculty member and sleep expert, you can answer that question simply by observing how much you sleep when you don’t need to get up.

“When you’ve been on vacation for two weeks, how are you sleeping during that second week? How long are you sleeping? If you’re sleeping eight or nine hours when you don’t have any reason to get up, then chances are you need that amount or close to that amount of sleep,” says Pace-Schott. 

Most students, however, get far less sleep than the recommended amount. 

Seventy to 96 percent of college students get less than eight hours of sleep each week night. And over half of college students sleep less than seven hours per night. The numbers are similar for high school students; 73 percent of high school students get between seven and seven and a half hours of sleep .

Of course, many students attempt to catch up on lost sleep by sleeping late on the weekends. Unfortunately, this pattern is neither healthy nor a true long-term solution to sleep deprivation. 

And what about those students who say that they function perfectly well on just a couple hours of sleep?

“There are very few individuals who are so-called short sleepers, people who really don’t need more than six hours of sleep. But, there are a lot more people who claim to be short sleepers than there are real short sleepers,” says Pace-Schott.

Consequences of sleep deprivation

The consequences of sleep deprivation are fairly well established but may still be surprising.

For example, did you know that sleep deprivation can create the same level of cognitive impairment as drinking alcohol? 

According to the CDC , staying awake for 18 hours can have the same effect as a blood alcohol content (BAC) of 0.05 percent. Staying awake for 24 hours can equate to a BAC of 0.10 percent (higher than the legal limit of 0.08 percent). 

And according to research by AAA , drowsy driving causes an average of 328,000 motor vehicle accidents each year in the US. Drivers who sleep less than five hours per night are more than five times as likely to have a crash as drivers who sleep for seven hours or more.  

Other signs of chronic sleep deprivation include:

• Daytime sleepiness and fatigue
• Irritability and short temper
• Mood changes
• Trouble coping with stress
• Difficulty focusing, concentrating, and remembering

Over the long term, chronic sleep deprivation can have a serious impact on your physical and mental health. Insufficient sleep has been linked, for example, to weight gain and obesity, cardiovascular disease, and type 2 diabetes.

The impact on your mental health can be just as serious. Harvard Medical School has conducted numerous studies, including research by Pace-Schott, demonstrating a link between sleep deprivation and mental health disorders such as anxiety and depression.

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Importance of sleep for high school and college students

As difficult as it is to prioritize sleep, the advantages of going to bed early and getting quality sleep every night are very real.

College students who prioritize sleep are likely to see an improvement in their academic performance.

If you are well rested, you will experience less daytime sleepiness and fatigue. You may need less caffeine to stay awake during those long lectures. And you will also find you are more productive, more attentive to detail, and able to concentrate better while studying.

But the connection between sleep and academic performance goes well beyond concentration and attentiveness.

“Sleep is very important for consolidating memories. In any sort of experimental setting, study results show better performance if you learn material and then sleep on it, instead of remaining awake. So there’s lots and lots of evidence now indicating that sleep promotes memory strengthening and memory consolidation,” says Pace-Schott. 

There is also a strong connection between sleep quality and stress.

Students who prioritize sleep are better able to cope with the stress that comes with being an active student. 

“It’s a vicious circle where the more stressed you get, the less you sleep, and the less you sleep, the more stressed you get. And in the long term, that can lead to serious psychiatric problems,” says Pace-Schott.

In the worst case scenario, the combination of lack of sleep and stress can lead to mental health disorders such as depression, general anxiety disorder, and potentially even post-traumatic stress disorder.

But prioritizing sleep can create a positive feedback loop as well. 

Establishing a sleep schedule and adequate sleep duration can improve your ability to cope with stress. Being active and productive will help you get more done throughout the day, which also reduces feelings of stress.

And the less stressed you feel during the day, the better you will sleep at night. 

Tips for getting more sleep as a student

The key to getting a good night’s sleep is establishing healthy sleep habits, also known as sleep hygiene.

The first step is deciding to make sleep a priority. 

Staying ahead of coursework and avoiding distractions and procrastination while you study is key to avoiding the need for late night study sessions. And prioritizing sleep may mean leaving a party early or choosing your social engagements carefully. 

Yet the reward—feeling awake and alert the next morning—will reinforce that positive choice. 

The next step is establishing healthy bedtime and daytime patterns to promote good quality sleep.

Pace-Schott offers the following tips on steps you can take to create healthy sleep hygiene:

• Limit caffeine in close proximity to bed time. College students should also avoid alcohol intake, which disrupts quality sleep.
• Avoid electronic screens (phone, laptop, tablet, desktop) within an hour of bedtime. 
• Engage in daily physical exercise, but avoid intense exercise within two hours of bedtime.
• Establish a sleep schedule. Be as consistent as possible in your bedtime and rise time, and get exposure to morning sunlight.
• Establish a “wind-down” routine prior to bedtime.
• Limit use of bed for daily activities other than sleep (e.g., TV, work, eating)

Of course, college students living in dorms or other communal settings may find their sleep disturbed by circumstances beyond their control: a poor-quality mattress, inability to control the temperature of your bedroom, or noisy roommates, for example. 

But taking these active steps to promote healthy sleep will, barring these other uncontrollable circumstances, help you fall asleep faster, stay asleep, and get a more restorative sleep.

And for students who are still not convinced of the importance of sleep, Pace-Schott says that personal observation is the best way to see the impact of healthy sleep habits. 

“Keep a sleep diary for a week. Pay attention to your sleep in a structured way. And be sure to record how you felt during the day. This can really help you make the link between how you slept the night before and how you feel during the day. It’s amazing how much you will learn about your sleep and its impact on your life.” 

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Causes and consequences of sleepiness among college students

Shelley d hershner.

Department of Neurology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Ronald D Chervin

Daytime sleepiness, sleep deprivation, and irregular sleep schedules are highly prevalent among college students, as 50% report daytime sleepiness and 70% attain insufficient sleep. The consequences of sleep deprivation and daytime sleepiness are especially problematic to college students and can result in lower grade point averages, increased risk of academic failure, compromised learning, impaired mood, and increased risk of motor vehicle accidents. This article reviews the current prevalence of sleepiness and sleep deprivation among college students, contributing factors for sleep deprivation, and the role of sleep in learning and memory. The impact of sleep and sleep disorders on academics, grade point average, driving, and mood will be examined. Most importantly, effective and viable interventions to decrease sleepiness and sleep deprivation through sleep education classes, online programs, encouragement of naps, and adjustment of class time will be reviewed. This paper highlights that addressing sleep issues, which are not often considered as a risk factor for depression and academic failure, should be encouraged. Promotion of university and college policies and class schedules that encourage healthy and adequate sleep could have a significant impact on the sleep, learning, and health of college students. Future research to investigate effective and feasible interventions, which disseminate both sleep knowledge and encouragement of healthy sleep habits to college students in a time and cost effective manner, is a priority.

Introduction

The college experience is of great value in providing emerging adults with a structured environment in which they can gain the knowledge, skills, and independence to chart their own path, become successfully employed, and contribute to society. However, this experience comes at great cost given rising tuition fees and ballooning student debt, and thus, it is vital that the college years be as efficacious as possible. A potential obstacle to maximizing success in college is the high prevalence of daytime sleepiness, sleep deprivation, and irregular sleep schedules among college students.

Daytime sleepiness is a major problem, exhibited by 50% of college students compared to 36% of adolescents and adults. 1 At least 3 days a week, 60% of students report that they are dragging, tired, or sleepy. 2 Sleepiness is defined as the inability or difficulty in maintaining alertness during the major wake period of the day, resulting in unintended lapses into drowsiness or sleep. 3 It is important to note that sleepiness is often circumstance-dependent, with many aspects of the students’ learning environment exacerbating sleepiness. 4 For example, a lecture that does not require active participation and may be in a dark, warm lecture hall can unmask underlying sleepiness. Sleep deprivation is defined as obtaining inadequate sleep to support adequate daytime alertness. 4 How much sleep a young adult needs is not clearly known, but is thought to be 8 hours. 5 , 6 Most college students are sleep deprived, as 70.6% of students report obtaining less than 8 hours of sleep. 7 The impact of educational major on sleepiness and sleep duration is not well studied, but the effect may be substantial. As reported at an Architecture School in the Midwest, only 4% of students obtained at least 7 hours of sleep at night; the average sleep duration was 5.7 hours, with 2.7 “all-nighters” per month. 8 Eighty-two percent of college students believe that inadequate sleep and sleepiness impact their school performance. 9 Students rank sleep problems second only to stress in factors that negatively impact academic performance. 10

Sleep deprivation and sleepiness are caused by a host of reasons and have numerous negative consequences. In the literature, sleep deprivation is often termed either acute sleep deprivation or chronic partial sleep deprivation. Colloquially for students, acute sleep deprivation is termed “pulling an all-nighter”, meaning that a person stays up for 24 hours or longer. More typically, sleep deprivation consists of chronic partial sleep deprivation, where a student obtains some, but not adequate sleep. Sleepiness can be an obvious consequence of sleep deprivation, but sleepiness can be caused by other circumstances, most commonly sleep disorders. To understand the consequences of sleepiness and sleep deprivation, knowledge of normal sleep and its impact on learning, memory, and performance are necessary. Equally important are potential interventions, as these may offer an opportunity to improve health and educational outcomes for this demographic. This article reviews the prevalence of sleepiness and sleep deprivation among college students, the impact of sleep on memory, contributing factors for sleep deprivation, potential consequences with a focus on those particularly applicable to college students, and available interventions to improve sleep among college students.

Regulation of normal sleep: the circadian rhythm and homeostatic sleep drive

Many college students are sleep deprived because they go to sleep late and wake up for classes or employment before adequate sleep is obtained. Two primary processes govern how much sleep is obtained, the homeostatic sleep drive and the circadian rhythm. The circadian system (internal clock) helps to regulate sleep/wake cycles and hormonal secretions while the homeostatic sleep drive increases the need for sleep as the period of wakefulness lengthens. The interaction of these two systems is described by the Two-Process Model of Sleep Regulation. 11

Physiologically, adolescents and young adults tend to have a delayed circadian preference, and are “night owls”. 12 This change occurs in association with puberty; more physically mature adolescents have a preference for later bedtimes and may have a lower homeostatic sleep drive, and consequently, are less sleepy at night. 13 – 15 The typical adult circadian period is 24.1 hours, compared to an adolescent’s circadian period of 24.27 hours; this longer period makes it easier for the bedtime to shift later. 15 , 16 A cardinal sign of a delayed circadian system is an irregular sleep schedule, where students have catch-up sleep on the weekend. Both high school and college students demonstrate a 1–3 hour sleep deficit on school nights, with a much longer sleep duration and often a later wake time on the weekends. 7 , 17 , 18

How the circadian rhythm and homeostatic sleep drive change with puberty is not well understood, but the cumulative effect is that adolescents and young adults feel more awake in the evening, have a difficult time falling asleep until later, and consequently, have insufficient sleep during the school week and catch-up on sleep on the weekend.

Exactly when this nocturnal preference or “night owl” tendency diminishes, remains unclear. When evaluated longitudinally, weekday bedtimes continued to delay until around 19 years of age, with weekend bedtimes remaining later until the early 20s, although other studies have shown this delay persisting until the junior year. 19 The transition from high school to college also has an impact; college students go to bed 75 minutes later than high school students. 7 In this study, freshman students’ bedtime was 12.22 am and 1.58 am with a rise time of 8.08 am and 10.26 am on weekdays and the weekend, respectively.

Learning, memory, and sleep cycles

Sleepiness and irregular sleep schedules have many unintended consequences, one of which is to negatively impact learning, memory, and performance. The precise details of the relationship between sleep and memory formation are not yet completely understood. The dual process theory maintains that certain types of memory are dependent on specific sleep states, such that procedural memory (knowing how) may be dependent on REM (rapid eye movement) sleep and declarative memory (knowing what) on NREM (non-REM) sleep. The sequential processing theory suggests that memories require an orderly succession of sleep stages, ie, memory formation may be prompted by slow-wave sleep and consolidated by REM sleep (see Figure 1 ). 20

The interaction of sleep and memory.

Notes: The dual process theory suggests that certain types of memory are dependent on specific sleep states, such as REM sleep, or slow-wave sleep (a stage of NREM sleep). The sequential processing theory suggests that memories require an orderly succession of sleep stages, eg, slow-wave sleep followed by REM sleep. 20

Abbreviations: NREM, non-rapid eye movement; REM, rapid eye movement.

Both theories may help to explain how a student’s sleep pattern could impact learning. 21 In one study, REM sleep deprivation eliminated sleep-induced improvement on a visual perceptual learning (procedural) task; the same effect was not found with selective slow-wave sleep deprivation. 22 REM sleep normally occurs every 90–120 minutes, approximately 4–5 times in a typical night, with each REM sleep period growing progressively longer, with the last episode near rise time. 23 Therefore, college students with early morning classes may not attain the last 1–2 REM sleep periods, thus adversely affecting procedural memory. However, other studies suggest that NREM rather than REM sleep enhances procedural memories, while other studies correlated improvement with slow-wave sleep followed by REM sleep. 24 – 26 Both of these theories support that sleep deprivation may limit the amount of REM sleep and/or slow-wave sleep that students obtain, which may compromise both learning and memory, but further research is required to clarify this.

Many studies investigating the interaction of sleep, memory, and learning use scenarios of a specific memory task and then alter subjects’ sleep pattern or duration to determine the impact that sleep had on the subject’s performance. These scenarios often may not directly correlate with the memory and learning that college students are expected to perform or the alterations in their sleep schedule they experience. Despite these limitations, these studies illuminate the impact of sleep on students’ memory, learning, and potential academic performance.

Some students may “pull an all-nighter” (24 hours or more of sleep deprivation) before examinations in the hope of improved grades. The literature suggests that all-night study sessions are the wrong plan for improved grades and learning. Subjects were taught a visual discrimination task to identify the presence of “T” or “L” and the orientation of three diagonal bars on a screen. Subjects who were sleep deprived for 30 hours showed no improvement in performance, even after 2 days of post-recovery sleep. 26 Non-sleep-deprived subjects’ performance improved for the next 4 days. In another study investigating if improvement correlated with time or time spent in sleep, subjects were taught a motor task and then tested either after a 12-hour period of wakefulness or a 12-hour period that included sleep. 24 Subjects tested at 10 am and then retested at 10 pm without sleep showed no significant change in performance. After a night of sleep, subjects’ performance improved by 18%. Subjects tested at 10 pm initially, then retested after sleep, also had a significant improvement in performance. This supports the concept that sleep, and not just time, is required for learning and memory consolidation. It may be possible that there is a window for potential learning that requires sleep, and that this opportunity for learning may not be salvaged even after sleep is recovered.

Sleep before learning may also be necessary. To investigate this concept, subjects were tested on an episodic memory encoding task, which involved viewing a series of images with a recognition test 48 hours later. 27 Subjects were tested after 35 hours of sleep deprivation; memory performance was approximately two letter grades (19%; P =0.031) worse when compared to the non-sleep-deprived subjects. This difference did not seem to be due to alertness, as there was no significant difference between the two groups in terms of response rate, which has been correlated with alertness.

Looking at more global functions, total sleep deprivation showed a significant decrease of performance in cognitive tasks assessing inference, recognition of assumptions, and deduction. 28 Although this study was not carried out on college-aged students, subjects aged 10–14 years of age restricted to 5 hours of sleep, had impaired performance on verbal creativity and abstract thinking. 29 Less complex cognitive functions did not appear impaired; this has been shown in other studies and may indicate that motivation, individual response to sleep deprivation, or certain tasks may be less impacted by sleep. 20 , 30

Learning may also affect the intrinsic aspects of sleep. Procedural tasks prior to sleep increased slow-wave activity in the right parietal lobe, an area that is responsible for visual-spatial skills. 31 This increased right parietal activity correlated with improvement in the task. Other studies have found an increase in spindles, a defining feature of stage 2 sleep, after procedural memory training. 32 In an intensive 6-week French language immersion course, improvement was correlated with an increase in subjects’ percentage of REM sleep. 33

In summary, these finding suggest that sleep, likely before and after specific memory tasks, plays an integral part in memory consolidation. Many of these studies isolate memory into specific areas such as visual, declarative, or procedural; however, college students’ learning, memory, and performance in classes rarely would have such a narrow memory domain. Further research with real-life circumstances of students would better help clarify these important issues.

Causes of sleep deprivation and sleepiness

Among college-aged students, one of the most common causes of daytime sleepiness is sleep deprivation, ie, students get inadequate sleep because they go to bed late and wake up early. This occurs for multiple reasons; some are physiologic and others behavioral. The behavioral components may be particularly problematic on college campuses. However, sleep deprivation is not the only cause of sleepiness as college students are not immune to sleep disorders, which may also cause sleepiness. This section will review common causes of sleep deprivation as well as the prevalence of sleep disorders among college students, and the influence of sleep disorders on sleepiness.

Inadequate sleep hygiene

Sleep deprivation can arise from poor sleep behaviors; sleep hygiene encourages habits conducive to restorative sleep and avoidance of substances or behaviors that are not. Good sleep hygiene includes a regular sleep–wake schedule, quiet sleep environment, and avoidance of caffeine after lunch and stimulating activities before bed. 34 , 35 Substances are not the only aspect of inadequate sleep hygiene, as the ubiquitous use of technology before bed may also adversely affect sleep. Many students have inadequate sleep hygiene that, in conjunction with their delayed circadian rhythm, encourages sleep deprivation.

Approximately four out of five college students drink alcohol, with nearly 40% of men and women reporting “binge drinking” at least 4–5 drinks in a row within the last 14 days. 36 , 37 Alcohol shortens sleep latency, but then promotes fragmented sleep in the latter half of the night. 23 One study found that 11.6% of students who drank used alcohol as a sleep aid. 7 , 38 Alcohol may also increase the risk for obstructive sleep apnea. 39

Caffeine and energy drinks

Caffeine, equivalent to 2–4 cups of coffee taken at night, can increase sleep latency on average from 6.3 to 12.1 minutes, reduce sleepiness, and improve the ability to sustain wakefulness. 40 In this study, the effects of caffeine lasted 5.5–7.5 hours, suggesting that caffeine consumed even in the afternoon could impair the ability to fall asleep. Caffeine is an adenosine receptor antagonist and can increase arousal. Caffeine also may act on gamma-aminobutyric acid neurons of the posterior hypothalamus to suppress sleep-promoting pathways. 23 The net effect is that caffeine increases vigilance, alertness, and decreases sleepiness.

Energy drinks are becoming increasingly popular and 34% of 18–24-year-olds consume them regularly. In 2006, Americans spent more than $3.2 billion on energy drinks. 41 The majority (67%) of users consumed energy drinks to help compensate for insufficient sleep. 42 The contents of energy drinks are variable and depend on the individual product, but usually contain caffeine, herbal products, and sometimes vitamins and other supplements. Caffeine is the primary constituent responsible for the effect of increased energy. The amount of caffeine varies widely from 45–500 mg. Use of energy drinks is associated with higher use of alcohol and possibly other drugs, including stimulants. 43

Use of either prescribed or nonprescribed stimulants is a growing problem in young adults. The most commonly reported reason is to “stay awake to study” or increase concentration. 44 Students may utilize these drugs more than age-matched non-students. 45 A survey at 119 colleges and universities across the US found a 6.9% lifetime prevalence for the use of stimulants. 46 Other studies show prevalence as high as 14%. 44 , 47 Men are more likely than women to use stimulants, as well as caffeine and energy drinks. Nonprescribed use of stimulants is associated with increased use of alcohol, cocaine, and marijuana. 46 Not all stimulant use is illicit, as between 2%–8% of college students’ self-reported symptoms are consistent with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). 48 However, when parents of college students were asked to report such symptoms in their children, the prevalence of ADHD decreased to around 1%. Stimulants increase sleep latency and suppress REM sleep; subjects who use stimulant medications report worse sleep quality. 23 , 47

Inadequate sleep hygiene also encompasses the use of technology prior to bed. Relevant data often must be extrapolated from literature on adolescents, as few studies have focused on college students. The 2011 Sleep in America Poll addressed technology available in the bedroom. “Generation Y’ers” (adults aged 19–29 years old) are heavy users of technology prior to bed: 67% use cell phones, 43% music devices, 60% computers, and 18% video games. The majority (51%) report rarely getting a good night’s sleep and often wake unrefreshed. Computer use in the hour before bed is associated with less restful sleep, higher Epworth Sleepiness Scales, and drowsy driving. 49 Frequent use of cell phones around bedtime is associated with difficulties falling asleep, repeated awakenings, or waking up too early. 50 Most young adults (57%) leave their phone on during sleep, with only 33% turning it to silent or vibrate modes ( Table 1 ). Playing video games before bed can increase sleep latency, an average of 21.6 minutes. 51 Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) shows that video game playing heightens cognitive alertness, especially during violent scenes ( Table 1 ). 52

Frequent use of technology before bed is associated with sleep difficulties and daytime sleepiness

Note: Data from National Sleep Foundation; 49 Dworak et al. 51

Light exposure from various sources, including computers, tablet computers (eg, iPads; Apple Inc., Cupertino, CA, USA), and cell phones may also impact sleep. Melatonin, secreted by the pineal gland, helps regulate the circadian rhythm to the environment. 15 Normally, it is low or absent during the day and starts to rise about 2 hours before the habitual bedtime. Melatonin is suppressed by light, and light sources as low 200–300 lux (room lights) can cause suppression. 53 The amount of light from technologic devices is variable; for example, a tablet computer generated 50 lux suppressed melatonin in a cohort of college students after 2 hours of use. 54 A case report describes a student in Brazil who had a 40-minute delay in sleep on the weekends when electric lights were installed. 55 Bright light (8,000 lux) given at 7 pm or at 9 pm reduced nighttime sleepiness in students who had an evening preference and those with a later onset of melatonin. 56 One of the effects of technology may be to suppress melatonin, resulting in a delay in sleep onset.

In summary, many students engage in behaviors, such as those described above, which increase stimulation and alertness prior to bed. This, in conjunction with their delayed circadian rhythm, encourages late bedtimes and insufficient sleep. To combat sleepiness, students often drink caffeine and energy drinks, compromising sleep and ensuring a vicious cycle of sleep deprivation ( Table 2 ).

Challenges to good sleep hygiene in college students

Note: Data from. 41 , 43 , 47 , 49 , 54

Sleep disorders

Sleep deprivation is not the only cause of sleepiness on campus, as sleep disorders may also play a role. A survey of 1,845 students in introductory psychology labs suggested that 27% were at risk for at least one sleep disorder or sleep-related problem, including obstructive sleep apnea (4%), insomnia (12%), restless legs disorder and periodic limb movement disorder (8%), circadian rhythm sleep disorders (7%), and hypersomnia (4%). 57

Obstructive sleep apnea can be associated with significant sleepiness. 58 The prevalence of snoring may be more common than expected, as 30% of non-overweight students in a California school reported snoring. Men more commonly reported snoring (42%) than women (25%). 59 Asian students (37%) more often reported snoring than African-American (24%) or Caucasian (27%) students. Although such observations of snoring frequency do not reveal the prevalence of obstructive sleep apnea among college students, they do suggest that this disorder may not be as infrequent among young, otherwise healthy college students as is sometimes assumed.

Consequences of sleep deprivation and sleepiness

College is a time of intellectual growth and development as young adults’ transition from adolescence to adulthood. Although the worth of college in terms of increased productivity and higher earning potential is rarely debated, there is a significant personal and societal cost of college both in terms of time and money. For optimal return on the investment of time, effort, and money, students need to maximize their learning, academic, and personal growth. Sleepiness from any cause can compromise these goals, through impact on learning, memory, grades, perception of effort, driving performance, and mood. Although sleep deprivation has effects on many aspects of health, this article will focus on areas that may be particularly problematic for college students.

Grade point average (GPA) and academic performance

Despite growing evidence of the relationships between sleep, learning, and memory, a direct connection between learning and GPA has not yet been established. 60 A student’s GPA is not just an indication of learning, but instead involves a complex interaction between the student and their environment. 61 Intelligence, motivation, work ethic, personality, socioeconomic status, health problems, current and past school systems, course load, academic program, and test-taking abilities all may influence GPA.

Existing evidence does suggest an association between sleep and GPA. Students who obtained more sleep (long sleepers, ≥9 hours) had higher GPAs than short sleepers (≤6 hours): GPAs were 3.24 vs 2.74 on average, respectively. 62 More evidence exists to support an influence of sleep patterns rather than sleep duration on GPA. Students at a community college near Washington DC showed no difference in total sleep time (TST), sleepiness, or morning preference between high (GPA >3.5) and low (GPA <2.7) academic performers. 63 High academic performers instead showed earlier bed and rise times, though with similar overall TST. No difference was present between the two groups with regards to a morning preference, but a validated questionnaire was not used.

Among first-year university students, sleep patterns also influenced GPA; each hour delay in weekday or weekend rise time decreased the GPA by 0.132/4.0 and 0.115/4.0, respectively. 60 Bedtimes were also influential, with later bedtimes associated with lower GPAs. TST or circadian factors were not evaluated. These results do not explain why an earlier rise time was associated with better grades; it could arise from the sleep schedule itself, but many potential confounders exist. For example, early risers may also be more motivated or organized. Another possibility is that negative influences arise when students who have a nocturnal preference are unable to wake up earlier. In a study of medical students, subjects with an evening preference on the Horne–Ostberg Questionnaire had a more irregular sleep pattern than students with a morning or indifferent-type preference. Sleep duration was not different between the groups, but subjects with a more irregular sleep pattern had lower academic performance. 64 This suggests that sleep patterns influence academic performance more than sleep duration, with the caveat that students who have an evening preference may have a more irregular sleep schedule.

Extreme forms of irregular sleep schedules include all-night study sessions. No literature appears to address the association between all-nighter study sessions and GPA, but the absence of sleep is known to affect learning and performance improvement. Subjects taught a visual discrimination task who were then sleep deprived for 30 hours showed no improvement in the task, even after 2 days of post-recovery sleep. 26 Non-sleep-deprived subjects’ performance improved for the next 4 days. Similar results were demonstrated with a finger-tapping motor task; without sleep, no significant improvement occurred. 24 All-nighter study sessions may also alter motivation and perceived effort. Students’ self-perceived effort and performance were evaluated following two sleep scenarios: 24 hours of sleep deprivation or 8 hours of sleep. 28 Despite performing worse, sleep-deprived subjects felt they had better concentration, effort, and performance than did non-sleep-deprived subjects. Why sleep-deprived subjects rated their effort as higher is not known, and could be due to sleep deprivation itself, or relate to other unknown factors. This perception of improved performance following sleep deprivation may in part explain why it can be challenging to get students to change their sleep behavior. If students perceive no impairment in performance due to lack of sleep, they have little motivation to change.

Sleep disorders and academic performance

Students with sleep disorders probably do not achieve optimal academic performance, and up to 27% of students may be at risk for at least one sleep disorder. 57 Students at risk for academic failure (GPA <2.0) were at a disproportionately high risk for sleep disorders. Among those who screened positive for obstructive sleep apnea, 30% were at risk for academic failure. Medical students classified as frequent snorers more frequently failed their Internal Medicine examination (47%) than did occasional snorers (22.2%) or non-snorers (12.8%). After adjustment for age, BMI, and sex, the relative risk for snorers to fail the examination was 1.26 (95% confidence interval: 1.01–1.57). 65 Obstructive sleep apnea is suspected to have cognitive effects in both children and adults. 66 A higher percentage of students at risk for academic failure screened positive for other sleep disorders including: periodic limb movement disorder/restless legs syndrome (21%), 67 insomnia (22%), circadian rhythm sleep disorders (26%), and hypersomnia (21%). 57 As nearly one in four students is at risk for a sleep disorder, screening for sleep disorders among students with poor academic performance may well be advisable.

Although many students have a nocturnal preference, this preference can progress to delayed sleep-phase disorder (DSPD), a circadian rhythm disorder characterized by sleep-onset insomnia and difficulty waking at the desired time. 3 Consequences of DSPD may include missed morning classes, increased sleepiness, and decreased concentration, especially in morning classes. Students with DSPD have lower grades. 68 The prevalence of DSPD in the US college population may be as high as 6.7%–17%. 68 , 69

One of the most concerning consequences of sleep deprivation and sleepiness is drowsy driving. In the 2011 Sleep in America Poll, 66% of young adults reported drowsy driving. 49 However, few studies have evaluated drowsy driving specifically in college students. Among 1,039 undergraduate students, 16% reported falling asleep while driving and 2% had had a motor vehicle accident due to sleepiness. Men were more likely to fall asleep while driving than women. 38 A school in Utah had 86 student deaths due to motor vehicle accidents over a 15-year period; dozing/sleepiness was thought to be causative in 44%–72% of the cases. In a retrospective review of students’ “closest calls” for a motor vehicle accident due to sleepiness, most near accidents occurred between 11 pm and 1 am and often (39%) during the first hour of driving. Nearly half (48%) of students had a less intense dozing episode earlier in the same drive, with 68% of students continuing their drive despite feeling sleepy. 70 The findings overall suggest that drowsy driving accidents or near accidents are too frequent and that students may minimize the warning signs of drowsiness.

Driving, sleep deprivation, and alcohol

The impact of sustained wakefulness on driving performance has been compared to the impairment of performance that is produced by specific blood alcohol levels. In adults, sustained wakefulness of 17 hours was equivalent to a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.05%, and 24 hours was equivalent to 0.1%, above the legal level for intoxication in the US and most countries worldwide. 71 , 72 Similar findings were found in males aged 19–35 years of age, in whom 18.5 and 21 hours of wakefulness produced changes in driving performance mimicking a 0.08% BAC. 73 Sleep deprivation in combination with alcohol has a synergistic detrimental effect on driving performance. To evaluate these effects, young male college students were sleep restricted to 4 hours in bed; they then consumed alcohol until they attained BACs of 0.025 g/dL or 0.035 g/dL, equivalent to about 1–2 drinks. 74 A simulated driving task at 2 pm monitored crashes, speed variability, and lane deviations. Crashes occurred in 23% and 33% of the subjects (BAC 0.025 g/dL and 0.035 g/dL, respectively), compared to only 4.7% in the controls and 19% in sleep-restricted subjects who had no alcohol.

Driving after drinking is commonplace during college, as up to 34% of students reported driving after drinking within the last 30 days. 75 The combination of sleep deprivation and drinking may be especially common at the end of the semester, when sleep-deprived students celebrate the end of exams with drinks before driving home for the holiday break. The dangerous combination of sleep loss and alcohol could impair driving performance even in students who are not legally intoxicated.

Mood effects

Depression and sleep are interrelated. A cardinal feature of depression is disturbed sleep. 76 , 77 Depression is common during the college years: 14.8% of students report a diagnosis of depression and an estimated 11% have suicidal ideation. 78 Insufficient sleep can increase depressive symptoms. In a study of female college students, sleep debt of 2 hours per night and/or a bedtime after 2 am was associated with greater depressive symptoms. 79 Irregular sleep schedules have been associated with greater depressive symptoms. Prolonged sleep latency was associated with loss of pleasure, punishment feelings, and self-dislike. 80 Differences between sex were apparent, as women went to bed earlier, slept longer, had more nocturnal awakenings, and reported more depressive symptoms. However, when the sleep variable was removed by deleting the question, “Have you experienced changes in sleep?”, no significant difference in sex persisted, suggesting the greater incidence of depression in college-aged women may be due in part to the greater number of reported sleep difficulties. 80 , 81

Improving sleep may improve depressive symptoms. Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) administered via email to college students with poor sleep quality produced greater improvement in depressive symptoms than did an intervention focused on mood and stress reduction. 67 A study on college students without reported sleepiness or depression found that sleep extension significantly improved scores on the Profile of Mood States. 82 Increased total sleep in teenagers has also been shown to improve mood. When school start time was delayed by 30 minutes, fewer students rated themselves as “at least somewhat unhappy or depressed”. 83 As sleep may be a modifiable risk factor for depression, further research is needed on ways to improve sleep and sleep quality in depressed subjects.

Complex relationships exist between suicide, mood disorders, and sleep. Insomnia may be a risk factor for suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and death by suicide. 84 Conflicting results have been reported on whether both insomnia and nightmares increase the risk of suicidal ideation. 85 , 86 A confounder is that post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may account for these associations. A study among college students found that insomnia and nightmares were independently associated with suicidal ideation. However, after depression, anxiety, and PTSD were taken into account, nightmares, but not insomnia, retained an association with suicidal ideation. The presence of nightmares in a student with depression may be a warning sign of increased risk for suicidal ideation that warrants further evaluation. 87

Potential interventions

While sleep deprivation, irregular sleep schedules and sleepiness are highly prevalent among college students, little information is available on effective ways for schools to successfully disseminate information on the importance of sleep and to potentially improve the sleep of their students. In general, the few programs that have been tried are expensive, time consuming, and available for only a limited number of students. A recent review of sleep education programs for children and adolescents found only twelve studies, of which four were available only as abstracts. 81

Educational programs

Improved sleep hygiene, which is widely believed to be beneficial, has been the focus of most educational programs on sleep, although there is little published support. An American Academy of Sleep Medicine Practice Parameter concluded in 1999 that insufficient evidence exists to recommend sleep hygiene as a single therapy or in combination with other treatments. 88 A study evaluating sleep hygiene awareness and sleep hygiene practice found only a weak association between knowledge and practice. However, good sleep hygiene practice was strongly correlated with good sleep quality. 35 Adequate sleep knowledge does not necessarily translate into practice. Many sleep hygiene recommendations, such as a quiet environment and use of the bedroom only for sleep, may be challenging in college dormitories.

One educational campaign with a focus on sleep hygiene included a “Go to Bed” poster, a 2-page “Snooze letter”, and sleep educational information in the school newspaper. An earlier bedtime, shorter sleep latency, longer sleep duration, and improved sleep quality, as measured by the Pittsburg Sleep Quality Index, was noted in 9% of students. 89 Although this intervention did not affect a large percentage of the student population, it was relatively inexpensive and did produce a measurable benefit ( Table 3 ).

Components in sleep educational programs

Note: Data from. 67 , 89 – 91 , 93

Sleep courses

In another study, a two-credit, 18-week course included group discussion, lectures, and self-evaluation. Topics included circadian rhythms, sleep hygiene, muscle relaxation, and public sleep education. 90 Participants had improved sleep quality over the semester and women reported decreased nap time. However, despite this intensive intervention, only a limited effect on sleep patterns was observed.

The Sleep Treatment and Education Program (STEPS) consisted of a 30-minute oral presentation and handouts on various aspects of sleep, provided to students attending introductory psychology classes. 91 Six weeks later, participants showed improved sleep quality and sleep hygiene. These results may be more robust than suggested, as sleep quality and sleep behaviors typically worsen as the semester progresses; therefore, this intervention not only halted this deterioration, but resulted in improvement. 92 Four supplementary sleep-learning modules, offered as extra credit, improved sleep knowledge and encouraged some sleep-related behavior changes, as 55% reported a change in their sleep hygiene as compared to 45% of control students ( P <0.01). 93 Students in the intervention reported specific behavior changes such as having a more “consistent wake time” versus a more general “trying to get more sleep” as indicated by the control students. However, all of these interventions are time consuming, involve only a select number of students, and may not be practicable on a large university scale.

Electronic cognitive behavioral therapy

More feasible options are under development. A modified form of cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) was emailed to students over an 8-week period. 67 Each weekly email contained an attachment to address several aspects of sleep, such as stabilizing the circadian rhythm by anchoring wake time, relaxation techniques, and a protocol for self-administered sleep restriction. This was compared to an alternative program (Breathe), which was created to reduce depressive symptoms and improve coping skills for stress. Participants in the sleep program (Refresh) had improvement in sleep quality and a decrease in depressive symptoms. Although the study involved only a small number (19 and 15, respectively), results showed promise as an effective electronic program that could be widely accessible and economically feasible for colleges and universities.

Class scheduling

The amount of sleep that students obtain is often dictated by the first obligation of the day, typically their first class. This is one reason why students often sleep longer and later on a vacation or summer schedule. 15 Therefore, class start times are an opportunity for intervention, but available information must be extrapolated from adolescent literature. A study at an independent college preparatory school showed increased sleep duration after a delay in school start time. The majority of students were boarders (81.5%) with structured lights-out schedules ranging from 10.30–11.30 pm. 83 When school was started at 8.30 am, 30 minutes later than usual, sleep duration was increased by 45 minutes on school days. An unexpected effect was that bedtime shifted earlier by 15 minutes. Following the time change, fewer students reported daytime sleepiness (49.1% to 20.0%), sleepiness in class (85.1% to 60.5%), and falling asleep in class (38% to 18%). A positive effect on mood was found, with a decrease in the Depressed Mood Scale. 83 Students continued to have significant “oversleeping” on the weekend, by nearly 3 hours. A study of eighth graders (mean age 13.7 years) who had 1 hour of sleep extension for 5 days through delays in the school start time, documented improved attention and performance. 94 This growing evidence from adolescents suggests that later school start times do increase total sleep duration, attention, and performance, but the data needs to be replicated in college students ( Table 4 ).

Potential interventions to reduce sleep deprivation and sleepiness

Although not often considered as an intervention for sleep deprivation, daytime naps may offer a potential remedy that may also help academic performance. Interestingly, in light of how napping may improve certain memory tasks, high academic performers were more likely to nap than low academic performers (52% vs 29%, respectively). 63 In a study of non-sleep-deprived subjects, deterioration in the performance of a visual perception task occurred during the day. 95 Intervening naps of 60 or 90 minutes halted this deterioration, but only naps with both REM and slow-wave sleep resulted in improvement compared to baseline. Sustained wakefulness can impair performance. In an episodic memory-encoding task (face and name recognition), significant deterioration at 6 pm occurred in all subjects, except those who had had a 100-minute nap. In the nap group, not only was performance deterioration abated, but improvement was noted. 27 Following training to recognize phonetically similar words, subjects showed an increase in accuracy, but 12 hours of sustained wakefulness reduced improvements by half. A nap prevented this decrement in performance. 96 , 97 In short, naps may enhance certain cognitive and performance tasks, but further research is still needed in this important area.

The college years are a time of critical transition from adolescence to adulthood. For many individuals, this transition is associated with inadequate sleep and daytime sleepiness. Many factors contribute to this, including the students’ own circadian physiology. Class times are often scheduled without consideration of young adults’ circadian patterns. Inadequate sleep hygiene is common, as students often use technology and substances that compromise sleep quality and quantity. This chronic sleep deprivation may impair academic performance, mood regulation, and driving safety. Students who attain sufficient sleep may still struggle with sleepiness due to sleep disorders.

Further research is needed to not only determine how to best educate students about the importance of sleep and the consequences of sleep deprivation, but also how to translate this knowledge into practice. Electronic or web-based interventions may be economically feasible and attractive to an electronically savvy demographic. Universities and colleges need to understand, acknowledge, and publicize that policies and class schedules may have substantial impacts on the sleep, learning, and health of their students. Investigation of new approaches to promote good sleep and sleep habits could have significant public health impact and should be prioritized.

The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.

• Open access
• Published: 28 June 2024

Adolescents’ short-form video addiction and sleep quality: the mediating role of social anxiety

• Li Jiang 1 &
• Yizoon Yoo 2  

BMC Psychology volume  12 , Article number:  369 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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Metrics details

Adolescence is a critical period for individual growth and development. Insufficient sleep adversely affects adolescents’ physical development, blood pressure, vision, and cognitive function. This study examined the effect of short-form video addiction on adolescents’ sleep quality, as well as the mediating role of social anxiety, to identify methods for improving adolescents’ sleep quality in the Internet era.

A questionnaire survey was conducted in this cross-sectional study on 1629 adolescents recruited from three high schools. Their short-form video addiction, social anxiety, and sleep quality were evaluated using corresponding scales. Pearson correlation analysis was carried out to analyze the relationships among short‐form video addiction, sleep quality, and social anxiety. Mediating effect analysis was constructed using AMOS 20.0 statistical software.

Participants’ sleep quality score is 6.12 ± 3.29 points. The detection rate of sleep quality among them is 31.06%. Short‐form video addiction, sleep quality, and social anxiety are significantly correlated ( r  = 0.439, 0.404, 0.457, P  < 0.001). The direct effect of short-form video addiction on sleep quality is 0.248, accounting for 62.4% of the total effect. The indirect effect exerted through social anxiety is 0.149, accounting for 37.6%.

Conclusions

Sleep disorders are very common among Chinese adolescents. Short‐form video addiction is positively correlated with adolescents’ sleep quality and social anxiety. Social anxiety partially mediates the relationship between short-form video addiction and sleep quality. The adverse effects of short-form video addiction and social anxiety on the sleep quality of this group must be minimized. Schools are recommended to implement measures to promote sleep quality among adolescents.

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Introduction

Sleep is one of the most basic physiological requirements for human beings. Adequate sleep not only promotes bodily growth, physical development, and immune function regulation but also contributes significantly to mental health [ 1 ]. Adolescents are in a special period of physical, cognitive, emotional, and interpersonal changes, during which sleep has unique implications for their growth [ 2 ]. Compared with college students and children, adolescents have more prominent sleep problems, with a higher incidence of sleep disorder and a trend of increasing deterioration [ 3 ]. Besides short sleep hours, adolescents have serious problems with sleep quality [ 3 ]. Sleep problems lead to a series of adverse outcomes, including decreased immune function, obesity, traffic accidents, substance abuse, depression, and suicidal tendency [ 1 , 2 , 3 ]. Psychological factors such as resilience, loneliness, depression, and stress can decrease individuals’ sleep quality [ 4 ]. Physiological and behavioral factors such as fatigue and excessive use of the Internet and smartphones can also affect adolescents’ sleep quality [ 5 ].

Short-form video, a new type of Internet-based content dissemination method emerging in recent years, has gradually become an important factor affecting adolescents’ sleep quality. Short-form videos are highly popular because of their rich and diversified content, favorable human–computer interaction mode, easy access, and short viewing time [ 6 ]. The number of short-form video users in China had reached 934 million by December 2021 [ 7 ]. As pointed out in “Blue Book of Teenagers: Annual Report on the Internet Use by Minors in China (2021),” adolescents have become the largest group of short-form video users [ 7 ]. A study on the negative effects of Internet use reveals that an increase in online time can lead to emotional changes, depression, and intense psychological conflicts, negatively affecting daily life. As a new form of Internet addiction, short-form video addiction refers to a chronic or periodic obsession state featured by the repeated use of short-form video apps (such as Tiktok, Kwai, etc.), resulting in strong and continuous craving and addiction [ 8 ]. Among the youth population in China, 49.3% of underage netizens watch short videos online. In addition, 60.4% of adolescent short video users reported watching short videos on Tiktok, and 59.3% of them reported watching them on Kwai [ 9 ]. Ye et al. [ 10 ] found in their research on college students that short-form video addiction exacerbates the negative effects on students’ academic and physical and mental health, for example, reducing learning motivation and increasing depression incidence. In short, this addictive behavior causes many negative effects, including psychological problems [ 10 , 11 ]. Zhang et al. [ 12 ] conducted a cross-sectional survey on Internet addiction and sleep quality in Vietnamese adolescents and found a significant positive correlation between Internet addiction and sleep quality. Internet addiction is a high-risk factor for poor sleep quality [ 12 ]. Short-form video addiction, as a new form of Internet addiction, exhibits the general characteristics of addictive behavior, such as strong and sustained cravings and psychological and behavioral addiction. Therefore, short-form video addiction may affect adolescents’ sleep quality, and the mechanism through which short-form video addiction affects sleep quality must be investigated.

Social anxiety is a phenomenon individuals experience in multiple social situations caused by fear that their words and actions may be negatively evaluated by others. Severe social anxiety can also cause social anxiety disorders in individuals [ 13 , 14 ]. A study using the cross-lagged model to examine the relationship between sleep and psychological symptoms finds that high levels of anxiety predict a sustained decrease in sleep time and quality [ 15 ]. Another study on young people shows that low levels of positive emotions and high levels of negative emotions are closely related to poor sleep quality [ 12 ]. Liu et al. conducted an online questionnaire survey on 1402 middle school students in China and found that social anxiety significantly predicts poor sleep quality [ 16 ]. People without sufficient sleep experience a decrease in their perception of happy emotions [ 16 ]. This biased emotional perception is associated with social dysfunction and psychological problems, and social anxiety is a common psychological problem among adolescents. Therefore, social anxiety, as a type of anxiety [ 17 ], negatively affects adolescents’ sleep quality.

A significant positive correlation is also observed between Internet addiction and social anxiety. Li et al. [ 18 ] suggested that as Internet addiction increases, adolescents spend more time and energy on the Internet and less on activities such as interpersonal communication. This imbalance results in decreased self-efficacy and increased loneliness, ultimately leading to social anxiety. According to the “uses and gratifications approach,” short-form video and other Internet social media provide adolescents who are unable to meet their belonging needs or maintain social relationships in real life with more opportunities to interact with others [ 18 ]. However, long-term addiction to virtual social media greatly increases the risk of individuals relying on short-form video. Adolescence is a critical period for the development of social anxiety [ 19 ]. Currently, studies on the relationship between short-form video addiction and social anxiety in this group are few. Hence, examining the internal relationship between short-form video addiction and social anxiety is necessary.

In summary, short-form video addiction may affect adolescents’ sleep quality, social anxiety may also affect their sleep quality, and short-form video addiction may significantly predict social anxiety. Focusing on adolescents, this study explores the mechanism through which short-form video addiction affect their sleep quality. The goal is to provide valuable reference for preventing short-form video addiction and improving sleep quality among adolescents.

Research methods

Research participants.

With reference to previous experience, large-scale sample surveys aim to make the selected samples representative. According to Kline [ 20 ], the sample size must be more than 20 times the number of items. Therefore, the sample size should be at least 860, considering the 43 items.

Using the stratified cluster sampling method, a questionnaire survey was conducted between June and July 2023 on first-year and second-year high school adolescents in Shandong Province, China. Third-year high school students were excluded in the scope of this survey because of their need to spend more time preparing for the upcoming college entrance examination in China. After obtaining informed consent from each participant, copies of the questionnaire were distributed to each class. The survey was conducted in the form of collectively filling out the printed questionnaire. Members of the research team explained the filling requirement before they asked participants to fill out the questionnaire. They were required to complete the questionnaire within the specified time. Those who met the following criteria were included: those with Chinese nationality; those proficient in Chinese with basic listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills; first- and second-year high school students; those without other confirmed mental illness; and those who have not participated in similar research before. Exclusion criteria were those who did not meet the inclusion criteria and those with reading disorders.

A total of 1655 copies of the questionnaire were distributed, and 1650 copies were collected. After checking the copies of the questionnaire collected, 21 copies were found to be filled out regularly, with all items unanswered or with some items unanswered. These copies were considered invalid. After 21 copies with regular or missing filling were excluded, 1629 valid copies remained, with an effective recovery rate of 98.4%. Among them, 832 and 797 copies were collected from first-year and second-year high school students, respectively, with an average age of 16.54 + 0.98 years old. The questionnaires were filled out by 831 male students (51.0%) and 798 female students (49.0%). Table  1 provides additional demographic information. Before conducting the survey, members of the research team explained the significance, methods, and precautions of the survey to all the participants, guardians, and school administrators. They emphasizes that the survey was conducted anonymously and that all data are for scientific research purposes only. The personal information of the participants would be strictly protected. Informed consent to participate was obtained from all of the participants in the study. This survey meets the requirements of the Ethics Committee.

Measurement instruments

Short-form video addiction scale [ 21 ].

This study referred to the Short Video-dominated Social Media Dependence Scale adapted by Hu et al. [ 21 ]. The scale was revised from the Social Network Dependence Scale prepared by Milošević-Đorđević [ 22 ]. “Social networking sites” in each item was changed to “short video social networking sites”. The scale consists of 6 items, scored from 1 indicating “highly disagree” to 5 indicating “highly agree” on a 5-point scale. A higher score means a higher degree of short-form video addiction. The internal consistency of this scale for measuring short-form video addiction among Chinese adolescents is 0.732 [ 21 ].

Social interaction anxiety scale (SIAS) [ 23 ]

SIAS was prepared by Mattick and Clarke [ 24 ] and revised by Chinese scholars Ye et al. [ 23 ]. SIAS measures anxiety and fear of expressing and being observed in social situations based on the description of social phobia in DSM-III-R. It contains 19 items, with the items 8 and 10 being reverse-scored. Items are scored from 1 (completely disagree) to 5 (completely agree) on a 5-point scale. A higher score indicates a higher level of social anxiety. When SIAS is used with Chinese adolescents, the Cronbach’s α coefficient is 0.874 [ 23 ].

Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI) [ 25 ]

PSQI is a self-rating sleep quality scale compiled by Buysse et al. [ 26 ] and then translated into Chinese by Liu et al. [ 25 ] for application in China. PSQI consists of 18 items, including 3 fill-in-the-blank items, 5 multiple-choice items, and 10 self-rating items. The total score on this scale is the sum of scores in seven factors, namely, sleep quality, sleep latency, sleep hours, sleep efficiency, sleep disorder, hypnotics, and daytime dysfunction. The total score on this scale ranges from 0 to 21 points. A higher score means poorer sleep quality. A total score greater than 7 on this scale is considered indicative of a sleep disorder. The Cronbach’s α coefficient of PSQI is 0.77 when applied to the Chinese population.

Statistical analysis

The data were analyzed using SPSS 20.0 statistical software, and the quantitative data that followed normal distribution were expressed as mean ± standard deviation. Independent sample t-test was used for comparison between two groups; one-way ANOVA was used for comparison among multiple groups. Student–Newman–Keuls method was used for pairwise comparison; Pearson correlation analysis was used for analyzing the correlation between two variables. AMOS20.0 statistical software was used for analysis of mediating effect, and the maximum likelihood method was used for parameter estimation. A difference was considered statistically significant if P  < 0.05.

Quality control

The following measures were taken to reduce response bias or social desirability effects in the self-report measures: (1) Prior to data collection, all members of the research team participated in collective training. The training included selecting participants strictly according to the inclusion criteria; specifying the wordings used for offering questionnaire filling guidance and explanation; discussing the problems and solutions possibly encountered during questionnaire collection; and standardizing the steps of questionnaire distribution, filling out, and collection. (2) During data collection, participants were informed that this study would be conducted anonymously without privacy disclosure to obtain their cooperation. After questionnaire completion, the researchers checked all items individually to ensure data integrity. (3) After summarizing the collected data, two members verified and input them. (4) While the participants were filling out the questionnaires, the researchers did not provide any suggestions or hints related to the study results.

Analysis of status and differences in short-form video addiction, social anxiety, and sleep quality

Adolescents have a short-form video addiction score of 13.79 ± 4.36, social anxiety score of 42.76 ± 14.23, and sleep quality score of 6.12 ± 3.29 (detection rate = 31.06%). No statistically significant differences are found in the short‐form video addiction score based on grade, only child status, gender, and family residence ( P  > 0.05). However, statistically significant differences are observed based on academic performance, family economic condition, and exercise frequency ( P  < 0.05). No statistically significant differences are found in the social anxiety score based on grade, only child status, gender, family residence, and exercise frequency ( P  > 0.05). Statistically significant differences are observed though based on academic performance and family economic condition ( P  < 0.05). No statistically significant differences are found ( P  > 0.05) in the sleep quality score based on grade, only child status, and family residence. Yet, statistically significant differences are noted ( P  < 0.05) based on gender, academic performance, family economic condition, and exercise frequency. The results are shown in Table  1 .

The Pearson correlation analysis shows pairwise positive correlations among short-form video addiction, social anxiety, and sleep quality. As shown in Table  2 , short‐form video addiction is significantly positively correlated with sleep quality ( r  = 0.404, P  < 0.05), short‐form video addiction is significantly positively correlated with social anxiety ( r  = 0.439, P  < 0.05), and sleep quality is significantly positively correlated with social anxiety ( r  = 0.457, P  < 0.05).

Analysis of mediating effect

To further explore the relationships among variables and test whether social anxiety mediates the relationship between short-form video addiction and sleep quality, this study established a structural equation model using Amos 21.0. The model had short‐form video addiction as the independent variable, social anxiety as the mediating variable, and sleep quality as the dependent variable. The specific path is shown in Fig.  1 . The results of parameter test show that the path coefficients of the three paths are statistically significant ( P  < 0.05), as shown in Table  3 .

Mediating effect model (standard regression coefficient)

To further examine the direct and indirect effects of short-form video addiction on sleep quality, this study used the bootstrap self-sampling method to calculate the effect values and 95% confidence intervals. The results are shown in Table  4 . The direct effect of short‐form video addiction on sleep quality is 0.248 (95% CI: 0.199–0.296), accounting for 62.4% of the total effect value (0.397). The indirect effect exerted through social anxiety is 0.149 (95% CI: 0.120–0.183), accounting for 37.6%. These results suggest that social anxiety partially mediates the effect of short‐form video addiction on sleep quality.

Discussions

Status and characteristics of adolescents’ sleep quality.

In this study, the total sleep quality score is 6.12 ± 3.29, and the detection rate of sleep disorder is 31.06%. These results are similar to the finding from other studies [ 27 , 28 ]. Adolescents’ sleep problems still require attention from the education department. Further analysis reveals no significant differences in sleep quality among adolescents based on grade, only child status, and family residence ( P  > 0.05). The similarity in the learning content and environment for first-year and second-year high school students likely explains the lack of significant difference in sleep quality by grade. No significant differences are found in the sleep quality between adolescents who are the only child and who are not and between those who live in rural areas and those who live in urban areas. However, some studies report that only children experience higher levels of emotional warmth and understanding from their parents than non-only children. Their families generally adopt a warm and sympathetic parenting style to establish an affectionate and trusting atmosphere, so only children have higher sleep quality than non-only children [ 29 ]. This finding may be related to the emphasis recently placed by school administrators and the educational community on strengthening mental health education among high school students. For example, family-school cooperative management programs such as “Family–School Alliance” help cultivate a sense of security and trust among adolescents, stabilize their emotions, and ultimately improve their sleep quality [ 30 ]. This reason also account for the significant difference in sleep quality among adolescents with different family residences.

By contrast, significant differences are found in sleep quality among adolescents based on gender, academic performance, family economic condition, and exercise frequency ( P  < 0.05). Further analysis indicates that girls have poorer sleep quality than boys. This result is probably due to physiological and personality factors that make girls more prone to tension and anxiety. In higher grades, academic performance significantly affects adolescents’ development of mental health [ 28 , 31 ]. Poor academic performance and greater learning difficulty lead to increased learning pressure, so high-school students experiencing both are prone to negative emotions such as learning anxiety. In addition, the subjective and objective factors such as self-isolation lead to poorer academic performance and sleep quality among adolescents. In addition, this study observes certain relationships between family economic condition and exercise frequency and adolescents’ sleep quality, which is consistent with previous research results [ 3 , 32 ]. Poorer family economic conditions worsen sleep quality. The reason is the a significant gap in living and educational conditions between those with good family economic conditions and those with poor economic conditions. The latter tends to have increased learning time, perceive pressure and mental tension, and suffer from poorer sleep quality [ 3 ]. In this study, 115 high school students have no exercise within a week, and 938 exercise one to three days per week, which to some extent indicates that their physical exercise is worrying. This frequency may be related to high school students having more learning tasks, less free leisure time, and insufficient self-awareness. Strengthening physical exercise is beneficial for reducing the occurrence of anxiety symptoms, and adolescents who exercise more frequently are more likely to have longer sleep hours compared with their peers who exercise less frequently [ 3 , 32 ]. In the past decade, short-term intervention studies find a significant correlation between objectively measured sleep hours and physical exercise [ 3 , 33 , 34 ].

Correlation analysis of short-form video addiction, social anxiety, and sleep quality

This study finds that short-form video addiction significantly predicts sleep quality. A higher degree of short‐form video addiction among adolescents results in poorer sleep quality. This result is consistent with the findings from previous studies on Internet addiction among adolescents [ 4 , 5 , 31 ]. During the daytime, high school students may be prohibited by teachers or school administrators from using mobile phones in the classroom because of overloaded academic tasks [ 35 ]. Many adolescents may excessively watch short-form video online before going to bed at night, thus decreasing their sleep hours. Besides, the blue light emitted by electronic mobile devices at night can interfere with the secretion of melatonin, a hormone that regulates sleep [ 36 , 37 ]. The radio frequency electromagnetic fields generated by electronic mobile devices can also disrupt normal blood flow and metabolic functions in the brain, thereby negatively affecting adolescents’ sleep quality [ 38 ]. Therefore, this study provides new ideas and references for improving the sleep quality of adolescents.

This study reveals a significant positive correlation between short-form video addiction and social anxiety among adolescents. This outcome is consistent with the research finding that Internet addiction leads to an increase in social anxiety among adolescents [ 14 , 39 , 40 ]. On the one hand, adolescents who rely on short-form video consume plenty of time to watch short-form video. The resulting difficulty in focusing their mind on learning or daily interpersonal communication likely leads to setbacks such as decreased academic performance and hindered interpersonal communication, thus giving rise to social anxiety among adolescents [ 39 ]. On the other hand, short-form video platforms feature both high-quality and poor-quality videos, with many videos exhibiting a materialistic bias. Negative content can trigger upward social comparison among adolescents. Long-term upward social comparison on social networking sites likely generates negative emotions, such as depression and jealousy, among adolescents, which are positive correlated with social anxiety [ 41 ]. Therefore, negative content further increases the level of social anxiety level coming from short-form video addiction [ 41 ]. Research indicates that short‐form video addiction indirectly reduces real-life interactions and contributes to interpersonal relationship barriers [ 41 ].

Moreover, social anxiety can increase the use of short videos among adolescents. At present, social anxiety is considered one of the predominant risk factors causing mobile phone addiction [ 42 , 43 ], and the findings of these studies to some extent support the results of the current study. According to the “uses and gratifications approach” [ 18 ], adolescents who struggle to meet their need for belonging or maintain social relationships in real life may turn to short videos for opportunities to interact with others, efficiently satisfying their need for interpersonal communication [ 18 ]. Doing so reduces the risk of poor interpersonal relationships and alleviates the pressure arising from unfavorable social environments. As suggested by social cognitive theory, individuals with social anxiety are prone to negative evaluations of their environment and other people. Those with poorer social support systems tend to have more severe social avoidance tendencies, are less able to integrate into the group, or are more likely to be excluded by the group [ 43 , 44 ]. Thus, they may seek social connections and a sense of belonging by watching short videos, ultimately leading to addiction.

Mediating role

The mediating effect analysis shows that short-form video addiction has a positive predictive effect on sleep quality (β = 0.248, P  < 0.05) and that social anxiety partially mediates the relationship between short‐form video addiction and sleep quality among adolescents (β = 0.149, P  < 0.05). In other words, short‐form video addiction not only directly predicts sleep quality but also indirectly affects sleep quality through social anxiety. The reasons are as follows: (1) Adolescents addicted to short-form videos tend to watch them without supervision from teachers or parents on their mobile phones during night breaks. The electromagnetic radiation generated by mobile phones affects the nervous system, disrupts brain function and metabolism, delays latency, cause dizziness and headaches, and decreases sleep quality [ 35 , 36 , 37 ]. (2) Loneliness comes from individuals’ failure to reach their ideal interpersonal communication level. Short‐form video addiction has become an important external factor contributing to loneliness [ 39 ]. Excessive Internet use can cause poor adaptation, leading individuals to immerse themselves in the virtual world, which reduces social interactions and creates interpersonal relationship barriers in real life [ 39 , 45 ]. Ultimately, excessive Internet use exacerbates social anxiety. The rich and diverse content of short-form videos and highly perceivable enjoyment they provide cause adolescents to overuse these videos, resulting in their reduced interpersonal communication and social skills in real life. When facing the real world again, these adolescents feel more detached from society and have a higher level of social anxiety. People with anxiety are likely to have poorer sleep quality and more prominent problems during daytime such as drowsiness, fatigue, and lack of concentration [ 46 ]. Individuals with high anxiety also harbor negative attitudes and emotions, exhibiting hostility toward external stimuli. Hostility is significantly correlated with poor sleep quality and ultimately decreases overall sleep quality [ 33 , 46 ]. Therefore, alleviating adolescents’ social anxiety can help alleviate their short‐form video addiction and improve their sleep quality.

In summary, adolescents’ short-form video addiction has become a social problem that negatively affects their physical and mental health. This study explores the effect of short-form video addiction on the sleep quality of adolescents, and the results indicate the need to actively address sleep quality issues and short‐form video addiction. In addition, alleviating social anxiety can alleviate the negative impact of short‐form video addiction on sleep quality, thereby improving the sleep quality of adolescents and supporting their healthy development.

Limitations and future direction

This study has some limitations. First, all the data were collected from subjective reports by the participants, which may probably lead to errors, such as memory bias and social desirability bias). Second, the sample was limited to students from three high schools in Shandong Province, China, which may introduce selection bias. Besides, this cross-sectional study lacked follow-up investigation. Future research should collect data from multiple sources (such as individuals, peers, parents, teachers, etc.) to measure relevant variables more objectively. Longitudinal tracking can be conducted to expand the survey scope and verify the internal connections among loneliness, short-form video addiction, and sleep quality as well as the corresponding mechanisms of action.

The results of this study can provide empirical support and beneficial insights for improving adolescents’ sleep quality, weakening the impact of short-form video addiction in the era of mobile Internet, and maintaining adolescents’ physical and mental health. Sleep quality remains a prominent problem among adolescents that require attention from the education department. Short‐form video addiction has a significant direct effect on adolescents’ sleep quality. Adolescents should learn to consciously suppress their desire to watch short-form video, reduce the frequency of their Internet use, and engage in self-control before falling asleep to ensure sufficient sleep hours. In addition, short‐form video addiction increases social anxiety among adolescents and leads to more negative emotions and less positive emotions, thereby undermining their sleep quality. In response, parents and teachers should consciously guide adolescents to master socializing strategies and improve their interpersonal skills to weaken the mediating effect of negative emotions such as anxiety on the relationship between short‐form video addiction and sleep quality.

Data availability

The datasets used and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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A Cooling Mattress Pad That Chilled Me to My Core

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from testing mattresses , it’s to generally keep your expectations low when it comes to anything labeled “ cooling .” A lot of mattresses are marketed as cooling, but a more accurate way to describe most of these beds would be “less hot.” It’s not that the purported cooling materials inside them don’t work, but that they often don’t work the way we expect them to — the idea is to keep you from getting too warm in the first place rather than hitting you with a cooling blast, like the AC in a car might.

A quest to actually be cooled is why I recently spent a few weeks testing the Chilipad Dock Pro Cooling Bed System, from Sleepme. A few years ago, Strategist writer and self-proclaimed hot sleeper Dominique Pariso tested (and loved) the brand’s original product, the Chilipad Cube , so as summer heat set in, I set up the brand’s newest cooling system, the Dock Pro . It’s similar to the Cube in that it’s basically a tube-filled pad that goes over your mattress and uses water to regulate temperature. However, it has a few upgrades from the older system: app controls (including the ability to schedule temperature changes), a control unit that more easily fits under a bed, and, according to Sleepme, more cooling power (95 watts for the Dock Pro compared to 52 watts for the Cube). If you want to get really precise , you can also synchronize it with Sleepme’s sleep tracker , which makes real-time temperature adjustments based on your sleep data, but I don’t have one, so I didn’t try that (the tracker also adds a lot to the cost, at $199 plus a $6 monthly subscription fee). Like the Cube, the Dock Pro comes in two models: a “Me” version that just covers half a mattress and a “We” version that covers the whole thing and has two zones, so that two sleepers can each control their own temperature preferences. Both come in queen, king, and California king (half-)sizes.

I have the “Me” version, which was easy enough to set up. I laid the Dock Pro’s mattress pad over a waterproof mattress protector (which the company recommends, just in case) and positioned it on my side of the bed; the hardest part was getting the two large elastic bands around the sides and bottom of the mattress. You can position the pad so the tube hook-up is at either the head or the foot of your bed, and I went with head because that made it easier to tuck the tubing and cords out of sight. You can place the control unit almost wherever you want, though the instructions say not to block airflow from the grille and air filter. I did notice after remaking the bed that the dark gray mattress pad was very visible through my white linen sheets — something to keep in mind if your sheets are at all sheer.

To finish the process, I used a large cup to fill the control unit’s tank with about two liters of water, as you might with a humidifier, added the provided cleaning solution (which the directions say to do during set-up), and downloaded the Sleepme app. There are buttons on the control unit that you can use to change the temperature, but the app allows you to customize and create scheduled routines, which I wanted to try.

One of the app’s most useful features is the option to create a “sleep program,” kind of like an alarm-clock schedule — you can set the Dock Pro to automatically turn on at a specific temperature, at a specific time, on specific days. From there, you can set it so the temperature progressively changes throughout the night for “optimal” sleep: If you put in your bedtime and wake-up time, the app will automatically suggest temperature changes throughout the night (getting cooler about 30 minutes after bedtime, then getting slightly warmer halfway through the night to optimize REM sleep). But you can tweak these, delete them, or add other automatic adjustments if you want. You can also turn on a “warm awake,” in which the Dock Pro will gradually warm to max heat to wake you up.

The Dock Pro can cool your bed to as low as 55 degrees or as high as 116 degrees. Initially, I set up a weeknight routine with a starting bed temperature of 65 degrees, because it sounded like a cool enough temperature that would make for a pleasant sleep in the early summer heat. When I went to bed, I was impressed: The mattress pad was quite chilly, and the sensation of laying on it was unique — it felt like I was floating on top of a cold body of water, but completely dry. Then, a while after shutting off the lights, I realized I was too cold, and having trouble falling asleep. I upped the temperature to about 75 degrees and still felt cool, but comfortable enough to drift off.

When I woke up in the morning my bed was super warm from the “warm awake” function. For the most part, I felt so cozy that I didn’t want to get out of bed. But if you sweat easily, I don’t think I’d recommend this setting, unless you really want to be sauna’d out of bed every day, since the Dock Pro’s max temperature is 116 degrees, and you can’t adjust the “warm awake” setting lower than that. If you want to wake up warm but not sweltering, you could just add a different adjustment to more subtly increase the temperature in the morning.

The mattress pad is very thin and, other than showing through my sheets, barely perceptible — I can’t feel any tubing through it, and it has stayed in place pretty well. My partner isn’t bothered by it, and says he hasn’t noticed much difference with the Chilipad on just half our bed. Maintaining the system has been straightforward. I’ve refilled the control unit about once a week during the three weeks I’ve been testing it. The brand recommends using distilled water; though you can use tap water, it may leave some sediment build up, which could reduce efficiency over time. I’ve used tap water so far, but if I keep the system on my bed in the long term, I’ll switch to distilled water to keep the everything in good condition.

And after a few weeks of fiddling with my sleep program, I’ve learned the most comfortable sleep temperature for me is somewhere between 75 and 80. Though I’m not an overly hot sleeper, I have appreciated the cooling effects as the temperatures have routinely been 90 degrees and above where I live in North Carolina. It should be plenty effective for people who feel like they are sleeping in an oven and want to feel more like they are sleeping in a fridge. And because I tend to get fairly cold at night during the rest of the year, I’m excited to try the warming features once fall and winter roll around.

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Understanding effects of heat on mental health

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A heat wave is affecting parts of the U.S., including much of the Southwest, through the Southeast and parts of Europe. When temperatures soar, the heat can take a toll more than just physically. Our well-being can suffer as well.

"A study of over 2 million people found an increased visit rate or incidence of people going to the emergency department with psychiatric and mental health-related concerns during periods of high heat," says  Dr. Robert Bright , a Mayo Clinic psychiatrist. "It showed a higher level of visits for substance abuse, anxiety, mood disorders, and even people with schizophrenia had an increased incidence of distress or issues with their illness, bringing them to the emergency department." Watch: Dr. Robert Bright talks about effects of heat on mental health

Journalists: Broadcast-quality sound bites with Dr. Bright are available in the downloads at the end of the post. Please courtesy: "Mayo Clinic News Network. Name super/CG:  Robert Bright, M.D. / Psychiatry / Mayo Clinic.

Heat and emotions

A common side effect of extreme heat is irritability, which can arise from physical discomfort and disrupted sleep patterns. The fatigue from sweating, working in the heat and the lack of quality sleep can leave people feeling stressed and on edge.

Dr. Bright says that others may be irritable due to heat. That can lead to tempers flaring or even road rage.

"It's really important for people to have grace for themselves and grace for other people. Everybody's struggling. It truly is something that's affecting every one of us, so step back and try to think through these things at a cognitive high-level. This is what's happening. Recognize that and do not just react impulsively from that emotional part of your brain," says Dr. Bright.

Heat and psychiatric medications

Certain medications can heighten the risk of heat-related issues from a psychiatric and medical perspective. Diuretics, for instance, can cause increased urine output, leading to dehydration , mental status changes and confusion.

"Medications used for mental health for illnesses, such as schizophrenia or bipolar illness, can change your regulation of heat and your ability to sense that you're too hot, your ability to sweat. I've seen people walk around with heavy mink coats when it's 100 and 105 degrees outside not recognizing that because of their lack of thermo regulation or ability to regulate their body temperature," says Dr. Bright.

Dehydration can also affect levels of some medications, such as lithium — which can become more concentrated in the body and potentially lead to toxicity.

"Some medications like lithium, for example, if you get dehydrated, your lithium level can rise significantly. Lithium has a very narrow therapeutic range. And you can become quite toxic with lithium, which can be quite serious with heart arrhythmias, coma, seizures and even death, if it got severe enough," Dr. Bright says.

Drinking plenty of water and staying cool can help mitigate these risks.

What to do 

And if you need help, seek help.

"If you're feeling really overwhelmed and as though you truly can't cope, then it's time to reach out for help," says Dr. Bright. "Whether that is walking into an emergency room and asking for assistance or contacting a therapist or counselor."

Finding ways to stay cool may be a good starting point to help reduce periods of intense heat. Dr. Bright says he knows only some people have air conditioning and recommends trying public spaces that may offer relief if you don't have access at home."If you don't have a place where you have air conditioning, and if you can, go to a cool place with air conditioning, go to the mall, go wherever it might be that you can go hang out for the day, go to the library to do those things to relieve yourself of some of the stress of the heat," says Dr. Whiteside.

Related posts:

• Mayo Clinic Q and A: Effects of hot weather, humidity on blood pressure, heart
• Mayo Clinic Minute: Heat exhaustion and heatstroke
• Mayo Clinic Minute: Mayo Clinic neurosurgeon performs innovative endoscopic spinal fusion surgery, advancing minimally invasive care Mayo Clinic Minute: How heat affects medication

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How marijuana impacts pain, sleep, anxiety and more, according to the latest science.

Are you using — or considering using — marijuana to help with anxiety, pain, muscle spasms, nausea during pregnancy, poor sleep and more? You may be surprised to discover there is little quality evidence on the benefits of marijuana, according to a new analysis of more than 100 clinical trials and meta-analyses.

Marijuana users have more heavy metals in their bodies

“After applying very strict quantitative criteria, and accounting for both observational studies and experimental trials, most of the associations between cannabis and health outcomes were supported by very low or low credibility,” said study author Dr. Marco Solmi, associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Ottawa and investigator at Ottawa Hospital Research Institute in Canada.

Much of the most convincing evidence in the study, in fact, pointed to the potential harms of using marijuana, especially for pregnant women, anyone with a mental health disorder and the adolescents and young adults who currently make up the majority of cannabis users .

“The most concerning findings are the multidimensional detrimental effects of cannabis on brain function, as reflected by associations with poor cognition (and) mental disorders, ” Solmi said.

“If we pair these findings with the fact that almost 2/3 of those with mental disorders have onset before age 25, it sounds reasonable to state that cannabis should be avoided in younger strata of the population,” he said.

The review did find some benefits of cannabis use, particularly with “seizure reduction, chronic pain, and muscle spasms,” said Carol Boyd, founding director of the Center for the Study of Drugs, Alcohol, Smoking & Health at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who was not involved with the study.

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However, most studies on seizures, nausea and pain have investigated the impact of carefully made synthetic cannabis or extracts, said clinical pharmacologist Robert Page II, who chaired the medical writing group for the American Heart Association’s 2020 scientific statement on marijuana. Page was also not involved in the study.

Such lab-made cannabis-based drugs have extremely high standards, and may even by regulated by the US Food and Drug Administration, which is not the case with most products members of the public can buy at their local cannabis dispensary, Page said.

“So, from a public health standpoint, I don’t want individuals to read this and say, ‘Oh, I can go down to my dispensary and take care of my pain.’ The answer is no, because the products patients are using in the real world are seldom being evaluated in these studies.”

Where marijuana may harm

Mental health: When it comes to easing the symptoms of anxiety, depression and other mental disorders, the analysis found no benefit. In fact, the opposite is actually true, Solmi said.

Mental health can be dramatically impacted by cannabis, the review found. Using the drug raised the risk of an onset of a psychotic or mental health disorder and using it after the onset of a mental condition worsened clinical outcomes, the study found.

“For instance, in people with psychosis, cannabis increases the risk of relapse, and worsens cognition,” Solmi explained.

Cannabis use disorder is common in one state where marijuana is legal

Psychosis, often defined as emotional upset so severe that a person loses contact with reality, can occur in people with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or severe depression. It can also be triggered by “sleep deprivation, certain prescription medications, and the misuse of alcohol or drugs,” according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

Pregnancy: Pregnant women too often turn to cannabis to ease their nausea, especially during the first trimester, studies have found. Yet the review found “convincing” evidence for a link between cannabis use and risk of having a small, low birth weight baby.

“Most of the literature on nausea during pregnancy is on prescription-level cannabis, which is synthetically made and carefully controlled as to dose, quality and levels of THC,” Page said.

Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, is the part of the cannabis plant that produces a “high” — a key reason marijuana helps with nausea and pain, he added.

“It alters perception, which can affect the experience of pain,” Page said. “I do not recommend pregnant women use cannabis because it is linked to low birth weight, and based on animal data, may have effects on the fetal brain. Cannabis can also be passed to the baby while breastfeeding — why take the risk when there are other, safer choices?”

Adolescence and early adulthood: Altering perception and reality while a brain is still developing, as is the case throughout adolescence and a person’s early 20s, is dangerous for cognition and mental health, the review found.

Using marijuana may affect your ability to think and plan, study says

“Adolescents and young adults in particular should be aware that cannabis can have detrimental effects on their mental health, should receive adequate information on effects of cannabis, should not use cannabis, or should monitor their mental health if they decide to use it,” he added.

Beyond psychiatric symptoms, clinical trials have found convincing evidence between cannabis and negative effects on memory, verbal cognition and visual recall, the study said.

“Cannabis worsens multiple domains of cognition,” Solmi said. “Our work can’t answer whether the effects are permanent or not, and more research should be conducted on that topic.”

Young people should “stop using cannabis if they notice a drop in educational achievements, social connections, mental health or functioning in general,” he added.

Where marijuana can help

Areas in which marijuana has been shown to help include seizures disorders, muscle spasms, chronic pain and sleep — but only for certain people, the study found.

“Cannabidiol (CBD) is beneficial for epilepsy, and cannabis-based medicines can improve spasticity in people with multiple sclerosis, pain in chronic pain conditions, (and) sleep in persons suffering from cancer,” Solmi said.

“Overall, cannabis was effective in improving pain across multiple measures of pain across different populations, he said. However, there is “no evidence cannabis improves sleep in the general population.”

Many Americans wrongly believe exposure to marijuana smoke is safer than tobacco, study finds

And no one suffering from any of these conditions should self-medicate with cannabis, Solmi stressed.

“Those suffering from epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, or chronic pain, should seek medical advice and not self-treat symptoms with cannabis, given that it can be associated with adverse events, as any substance or medication that is commonly prescribed,” Solmi said.

Still, the review found conclusions with high certainty in either direction — positive or negative — were few and far between, said Cinnamon Bidwell, associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of Colorado Boulder, who was not involved in the research.

“This literature has been strongly limited by regulatory barriers that restrict cannabis research,” she said. “The biggest take home from this summary is a need to provide pathways for researchers to conduct many more rigorous and valid trials on the harms and benefits of forms of cannabis accessible on legal markets.”

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